


In Which Niall Gets Married and Everyone Else Behaves Terribly

by roaroftheninth



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-06
Updated: 2014-01-19
Packaged: 2017-12-10 13:42:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 24,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/786683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roaroftheninth/pseuds/roaroftheninth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Niall's getting married. (Provided his posse of ridiculous friends and his step-brother Louis can act like adults for ten seconds.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which Louis and Liam Arrive

**Author's Note:**

> This is an AU in which the boys are just regular boys, not internationally famous pop stars. Niall and Louis are step-brothers, and everyone else is in the wedding party. I'm going to update once every couple of days. 
> 
> And I'm not even sorry about how ridiculous this is.

The tires crunch on the gravel as the car comes down the drive at a crawl, like the driver is uncertain of where to go. Niall raises one hand to shade his eyes from the sunlight and waves with the other, watching the approach of the vehicle with a barely contained grin.

 

The door flies open practically before the car has even come to a stop. “ _Nialler!_ ”

 

Niall starts toward the car even as a blur of striped polo shirt and yellow skinny jeans hurls itself free from its confines and throws itself at him. Niall, unprepared for Louis’ _entire weight_ , staggers once and collapses onto the gravel.

 

“All right?” Louis is grinning, his face six inches from Niall’s.

 

Niall blinks at him, winded.

 

“Yeah, you’re all right.” Louis plants a sloppy kiss on his forehead and clambers to his feet, reaching down to offer Niall a hand up.

 

“Wasn’t expecting you ‘til later in the afternoon,” Niall says, as he dusts himself off. “When I got your text, I was helping my dad and your mum put up the tent.”

 

“Well, what are step-brothers for if not to throw a monkey wrench into your best-laid plans?” Louis reaches out and brushes the pebbles off of Niall’s shoulders. “How are you? Where’s your bride-to-be?”

 

“She’s out for a bit with her bridesmaids,” Niall replies. “Doing… whatever women do before weddings.”

 

“Convene with Satan,” Louis supplies.

 

“I think Brooke would be a soft-core Satanist at best,” Niall says.

 

“The horns never come out until after the wedding,” Louis tells him, patting his shoulder sympathetically. “When she gets back, drop me a text. I need to ask her the routine questions; see what her intentions are with my little brother.”

 

“Her intentions are to marry me, I think,” Niall answers. “Just the impression I got when I asked her and she said yes. I could be way off-base.”

 

“That’s my duty to find out,” Louis says solemnly. “Where’s my mum and Bob?”

 

“Back yard.” Niall waves a hand in that general direction. “They’re cursing at each other over that tent.”

 

“Ah, true love,” Louis sighs. “I’m going to go and say hello. Coming?”

 

“Yeah, yeah. Lead the way.”

 

When they come around the corner of the house, Louis regaling Niall with the trauma of his flight – “The bloke next to me got up _six times_ to drink whiskey. He needed to drink it _standing up_ , what even is that” – Niall’s father is attempting, in vain, to raise a fallen corner of the tent. Louis’ mother is on the other side, yelling suggestions with a cocktail in her hand and a grin that suggests she harbours no desire to legitimately be helpful.

 

So basically everyone knows where Louis gets it from.

 

“Hang on,” says Niall, spotting an odd lump under the collapsed corner of the tent. “Who’s under there?”

 

“Who do you think?” Bobby Horan grunts, red-faced as he attempts to leverage the thick, difficult material.

 

“I’m starting to get hungry under here,” comes that plodding drawl from under the canvas. “Someone hiff me a snack.”

 

“ _Harry’s_ under there?” Niall asks.

 

“I’d like a roll,” Harry’s voice continues.

 

“What’s he doing?” Niall ducks down and tries to get a look under the canvas, but there are too many folds of it.

 

“Or a banana.” Harry doesn’t seem to mind that no one’s listening.

 

“Not asphyxiating,” the elder Horan replies shortly. _Unfortunately._

 

“I’m Louis,” Louis calls.

 

The shape under the tent stirs. “Louis, do you happen to have any snacks on you?”

 

“ _Help me get him out,_ ” Niall’s father snaps, and Niall and Louis hurry to assist, taking up corners of fabric. It takes a moment, but after some tugging and lifting and rearranging – “That’s not the tent, Louis, those are my trousers” “Oh, I know” – they’re able to straighten it out and lift the fabric up. Niall hurries to drag the pole that collapsed back upright so that the tent doesn’t fall again.

 

“He told me to stand under the canvas to hold it up while he affixed it to the pole,” Harry says, climbing to his feet and looking none the worse for wear for having been buried under a half-collapsed wedding tent for several minutes.

 

“You could have crawled out,” Niall points out.

 

“I didn’t know which way was out. What if I’d crawled deeper into the darkness, never to be seen or heard from again?”

 

Niall laughs, which is essentially his standard response to ninety per cent of the things that come out of Harry’s mouth. It’s one of the reasons why they’ve been best friends for so long. “I think it’s a wedding tent, not an endless abyss.”

 

Harry’s mouth curls into a slow smile. “I thought so too, but then I thought, best not take my chances.”

 

“You’re amazing,” Louis decides, out of nowhere. He's been watching the conversation, fascinated.

 

“I also answer to Harry,” Harry replies, turning those disconcerting green eyes on him. “But I s’pose I’ll take Amazing, in a pinch.”

 

“I would have tossed you a snack, had I had one,” Louis says.

 

Harry nods, like it’s a solemn promise. “You’re a good man.”

 

“Best man, in fact,” Louis says, slinging an arm around Niall.

 

Harry regards him for a moment, then looks at Niall. “Yeah?”

 

“Ah.” Niall had forgotten about this bit. He abruptly looks uncomfortable. “See, Lou, when I asked you to be my best man, it’s because I thought you wouldn’t make it to the wedding.”

 

Louis looks back and forth between Harry and Niall and pieces it together. “So you – you _fake_ -asked me to be your best man?”

 

“No, I meant it,” Niall says firmly. Louis has a penchant for theatrics; Niall’s trying to cut it off at the head. “You’re my step-brother, and before you went to America you were my best mate.”

 

“But now I’m chopped liver?” Louis demands.

 

“Well, I asked Harry, because he was my roommate in uni and we got into all kinds of trouble together,” Niall says. “And Harry’s the one who got me to join AA, too, before I managed to ruin things with Brooke.”

 

Louis snorts. “You’re not an alcoholic, you’re just Irish.”

 

Niall looks like he’s not sure if he should laugh or be gravely offended.

 

“He _was_ an alcoholic,” Harry interrupts. It’s not even rude when he does it; he’s simply addressing them in that slow, deep, drawl that he has, hands tucked casually into his pockets. Louis, despite himself, is kind of in awe. “He used to drink every night. It was funny during uni, him being the life of the party, but then it was time for us to get jobs and move into a real flat and I realized it wasn’t funny anymore when he couldn’t stop.”

 

Louis looks thrown; he didn’t know about any of this, and there’s something about the way that Harry takes better care of Niall than Louis does that gets under his skin. He knows it’s unfair and doesn’t care. “Well, good thing you were here to sort it out, then,” he says.

 

“Lou,” Niall begins, already pleading, but Louis raises his hands in surrender.

 

“I’m not making a scene,” he says. “You’re entitled to whoever you’d like as your best man, Nialler. It’s your wedding.”

 

“No hard feelings,” Harry says, watching him.

 

“No hard feelings,” Louis agrees. He hates Harry Styles.

 

Niall’s looking at him like he _knows_ , so Louis makes up an excuse – “Should go grab my stuff from the boot; I’ve got a gift for you, like a pre-wedding thing, I’ll give it to you at dinner, you’ll love it” – and walks off quickly toward the house.

 

Harry watches him go, considering.

 

“Sorry,” Niall says quickly. “Forgot I’d asked him. It was ages ago, when Brooke and I first got engaged.”

 

“No worries, Ni,” Harry replies, tucking an arm around him. “I don’t mind sharing, if he’d go for that.”

 

Niall glances up at him. “Yeah? You don’t have to. Louis’ll be more than enough of a presence as a regular groomsman.”

 

“No, I think it’s better if we’re both your best man,” Harry says, nodding slowly. “He’s your step-brother. Family’s important. And it’ll make him feel better.”

 

Niall tries not to look as relieved as he feels. He nudges Harry in the ribs. “I owe you one.”

 

\--

 

Liam hefts his duffel higher up on his shoulder and squints up at the house. He’s never been to the place Niall’s dad and step-mum bought after Mr. Horan retired, and he’s not sure what he was expecting but it certainly wasn’t anything this…  _elegant_. Liam had initially figured that everyone would be staying in a hotel, but Niall had insisted on having the wedding party stay at the house, so Liam had assumed it was big. It’s better than big, though; it’s a proper estate house, with well-maintained grounds and old-world charm. He doesn’t think he’s seen anything like it outside of a magazine.

 

“Liam!”

 

He turns, and there’s Niall and Harry coming around the corner of the house. Niall picks up his pace as he approaches, gunning for a hug – when is Niall  _not_  – while Harry follows, hands tucked loosely into his pockets, grinning indulgently.

 

“Hey,” Liam says a bit breathlessly, smiling in spite of himself as Niall wraps his arms around him and practically  _clings._

 

“Group molestation,” Harry declares, attaching himself to Liam’s back.

 

“Thanks, everyone, I – oi.” He jerks his hips as Harry reaches down between his legs to get a good-natured fistful.

 

“Missed you,” Harry says innocently.

 

“Thanks – I suppose. Let me – let me put my stuff down.” Liam disentangles himself with difficulty and sets his bag down on the drive.

 

“Where’s Danielle?” Niall asks, glancing past Liam as though he expects her to appear suddenly from Liam’s shadow.

 

“She’s… she’s got a big deadline at work,” Liam says, scratching the back of his head. “And her mum’s been sick so she’s been busy helping her.”

 

“Is she not coming to the wedding, then?” Niall asks, watching Liam with one eye squinted shut against the sun.

 

“Uh – no.” Liam shifts his weight. “No, I don’t think so.”

 

Harry looks like he’s about to say something, but Niall glances fleetingly at him and declares: “More wedding cake for me, then!” And Harry swallows whatever it is he was thinking.

 

“Yeah.” Liam smiles, but it seems strained.

 

“I’ll show you your room,” Harry volunteers, stepping right into that half-beat of silence that threatened to make things awkward.

 

“That’d be awesome, yeah,” Liam says, latching onto it gratefully. “I want to grab a bit of a nap, it was a long drive.”

 

“Nap when you’re dead,” Niall says. “Put your stuff away and then I’ll show you the pond. I want to have a beer on the dock and find out what you’ve been up to.”

 

“You’re drinking again?” Liam asks, glancing at Harry as though double-checking that this is a thing that is okay.

 

“O’Doul’s, mate,” Niall reassures him. “I’m still on the wagon.”

 

Harry picks up Liam’s bag, making a show of how heavy it is (it’s not). “Come on; you’re up on the third floor with me.”

 

“If we’re sharing a bed, I have rules,” Liam says at once.

 

Harry grins.

 

They start off toward the house, Niall separating from them once they reach the front door – “I’ll grab drinks; see you in the back yard in ten” – and leaving them to climb the wide front staircase alone.

 

Harry is mid-way through one of his usual long, rambling stories by the time they reach the room that Harry declares is theirs. He drops Liam’s bag onto the floor next to the closet and flops down on the bed, while Liam does a circle of the room, inspecting the impressive view to be had from the back window.

 

“How’s life in Scotland?” Harry asks.

 

Liam shrugs. “About the same as life in London, I suppose.”

 

“But with more haggis,” Harry adds.

 

Liam glances over his shoulder. “I like haggis.”

 

Harry makes a face at him. “You also like black pudding.”

 

“So would you, if you’d try it.”

 

Harry gives him a lofty look that says he knows what his food preferences are, thanks, and he has no need to expand his horizons. There’s a comfortable silence, as Liam watches Niall and Louis – with whom Liam is well acquainted; he and Niall have been friends since primary – kick around a football under the wedding tent.

 

“We should Skype more,” Harry decides.

 

“Yeah, you say that and then I get two months of radio silence while you shack up with  _Nick Grimshaw_  –”

 

“As if you wouldn’t shack up with Nick Grimshaw, given half the chance,” Harry says, with a self-satisfied grin. “He’s fit. And he’s famous.”

 

“He’s a radio DJ,” Liam points out.

 

“You don’t  _start_  at George Clooney,” Harry replies dismissively, with a lazy flick of his hand. “You work your way up.”

 

Liam shakes his head, good-humoured. “I suppose he’s sort of fit.”

 

“Yeah, I mean, if you have  _eyes_ ,” Harry says, feigning boredom.

 

Liam pokes him in the ribs in reply as he drops down on the bed next to him. Harry tries his best to look affronted, but if he responds in kind it’ll definitely start a war, and Harry’s too comfortable to engage in a duel to the death right now.

 

“A propos of nothing at all,” Harry begins conversationally, apparently deciding that now is as good a time as ever, “did you know that Zayn’s coming?”

 

Liam freezes.

 

“He’s not arriving until tomorrow,” Harry says at once, reaching out and hooking a finger in Liam’s collar to drag him backward. Liam gives in, letting Harry pull his head onto his lap.

 

“Of course he’s coming,” Liam says, although he doesn’t sound as sure as he means to. “He’s Niall’s friend, too.”

 

“Yeah, but, he’s sleeping downstairs,” Harry replies, carding his fingers through the hair that Liam’s slowly growing back. “Are you going to be good with that?”

 

“He’s – oh.” Liam is carefully looking at the ceiling instead of Harry. “He’s in the wedding party?”

 

Harry almost winces. “Yeah. I reckon Niall thought – you know, it’s been a couple of years now, and you might be able to get along for the weekend.”

 

“No, he’s right,” Liam says at once. “He’s – yeah. We’ll get along. Not an issue.”

 

He doesn’t sound like it’s not an issue, but that’s probably because Harry can read him like an open book.

 

“You don’t even have to talk to him. You can talk to me instead and if he tries to get into it, I’ll transport you away via piggy-back,” Harry says loyally.

 

Liam reaches up and hooks his pinky finger around Harry’s. “Thanks, Haz.”

 

Harry curls his finger tightly around Liam’s. “That’s what I’m here for.”


	2. In Which Niall is Victorious and Harry's Not Hungover Enough for Liam's Liking

Niall dribbles the ball between his feet and passes it to Louis. “You have to be my best man, if I ask you to. It’s  _my_  wedding.”

 

“No, I don’t.” Louis kicks it back, a little wide, and Niall chases it down.

 

“Harry said he wanted to be co-best man with you,” Niall insists.

 

“When have I ever been good at sharing?”

 

Niall shuffles his bare feet in the grass, his eyes tracking the ball as Louis messes about with it. “What do I have to do to convince you?”

 

Louis puts his hands on his hips. “I don’t know. Give me a speech.” He waves a hand with a flourish. “Something rousing, to stir the very blood in my veins.”

 

Niall rolls his eyes. “Lou Tomlinson. You’re my step-brother, and a tosser, but I love you anyway, and I want you to be co-best man with my mate Harry Styles, whom you would probably like if you gave him a fair shot.”

 

Louis boots the ball toward Niall, who only just manages to stop it, scowling. “Nope,” Louis decides. “I don’t like that speech. Try again.”

 

Niall gives a cross between a nod and a head-shake as he considers it. “All right, how’s this for a speech,” he says slowly. “If you don’t do it, I’m going to get smashed and stumble about until I fall in the pond.”

 

Louis stares at him in disbelief. “Did you just play the alcoholic card?”

 

Niall tucks his hands into his pockets, blinking innocently. “Just, you know, I might be driven to drink, is all.”

 

“I don’t believe you,” Louis says.

 

Niall punts the ball at him, then darts left and snags Louis’ beer bottle from where Louis’ got it propped up against the tent pole. Louis lunges toward him, but Niall is already dancing away from him.

 

Louis gapes at him. “You can’t use your sobriety as leverage.” He chases him, but Niall’s had a head start and he’s quick.

 

“Don’t make me do it, Lou,” Niall begs, with a mad little twinkle in his eye that makes Louis want to hit him. “Say you’ll be my best man. Say it!”

 

“Give me  _that_ ,” Louis growls, hurtling after him.

 

“Say it!” Niall calls back, laughing in earnest now.

 

“You can’t make me!”

 

Niall sprints onto the dock, freeing the little fishing boat moored there with a tug on the knot and leaping into it. He sloshes beer all over his hand, but he successfully manages to push away from the dock.

 

“ _Niall_ ,” Louis hisses, but if his step-brother thinks he’s getting away that easy, he’s mistaken; Louis leaps into the water, limbs flailing.

 

Niall yelps with laughter and fumbles for the oar, eyes on the spot where Louis went in. He surfaces a moment later, his carefully coiffed hair hanging, sopping, in his eyes.

 

“You missed the boat,” Niall calls.

 

“ _SOMETHING IS TOUCHING MY FOOT._ ”

 

“Seaweed, mate,” Niall says, laughing. “Or, y’know, could be one of those man-eating fish with the giant teeth. There are a lot of those in these parts.”

 

Louis gives a flail and a splash and begins swimming toward the boat.

 

Niall pushes off the bottom with the oar, sending the boat drifting away from Louis.

 

“ _I’M GOING TO BE EATEN_ ,” Louis shouts, aiming a splash at Niall that doesn’t quite reach. “Let me  _in_ , for god’s sake. I’ll be your stupid co-best man!”

 

 --

 

Harry and Liam come around the corner of the house as Niall and Louis approach from the lake, shoving each other. Niall is grinning from ear-to-ear and Louis, soaked to the skin, looks like he’s trying his best to play the injured party, although his lips keep twitching.

 

“Just in time,” Niall crows, when he sees them. “After some persuasion – ”

 

“And a not-inconsiderable amount of blackmail,” Louis adds.

 

“ – Lou has agreed to be co-best man with Harry.” Niall beams.

 

“Great news,” says Liam, who missed the earlier mini-confrontation.

 

“Yeah, it is.” Harry’s smile is genuine, and Louis decides to respond to that by ignoring him.

 

“I’m going to put on dry clothes,” he announces.

 

Liam watches him go, puzzled. “I sense that I’m missing something.”

 

“Nah.” Harry’s eyes are fixed on Louis’ back, too. “There was a mix-up over who was best man, but it’s sorted now.”

 

“That – seems like a fairly big mix-up,” Liam says.

 

“I’ll take the blame for that,” Niall replies, a little rueful. “Louis was impossible but Harry was a gent about it.”

 

“I sort of like him when he’s being impossible,” Harry decides, out of the blue. Neither Liam nor Niall look particularly surprised; Harry has a tendency to make snap judgments about people, and once he’s your friend, he’s your friend  _forever._

 

Niall snorts. “You haven’t seen him being properly impossible yet.”

 

“Always means well, though,” Liam points out.

 

“Yeah, of course,” Niall agrees. “Doesn’t stop me from wanting to occasionally bludgeon him with something heavy, but he always means well.”

 

“Oi.” All three boys shade their eyes, looking up at the balcony. Louis’ mum is leaning over the railing, waving at them. “Come up, Brooke will be home soon and I made fun cocktails. Niall, yours is the one with the umbrella in it.”

 

“That’s the one with no rum,” Niall’s dad supplies helpfully, from somewhere inside the room off the balcony.

 

“No, that’s the one with cocaine in it,” Louis’ mother says, sounding suspiciously like her son. She grins down at the boys. “Come on, come on, we’ll have a toast.”

 

Not needing to be asked twice, the three of them traipse up along the side of the house toward the front.

 

“By the way, Liam,” Niall begins, sounding hesitant. “Speaking of things I’ve messed up and am taking the blame for – I may have asked Zayn to stand in the wedding party as well.”

 

Liam’s shrug is more of a hunch of his shoulders than anything, but it’s a better response than Niall was expecting. “Yeah. Harry mentioned it earlier.”

 

“Ah. Good. So…” Niall wants to test the waters here, because Liam doesn’t exactly shout his feelings from the rooftops.

 

“Oh – it’s fine. I’m fine.” Liam flashes Niall a smile over his shoulder. If it’s insincere, it’s not for lack of trying. “We’re adults, yeah? We’ll just – do what we have to do, and be civil. It’s your wedding and you should be able to have us both here if you want us.”

 

Niall claps a hand on Liam’s shoulder, relieved. “You’re brilliant. I owe you one, Liam. Or several.”

 

Liam shakes his head quickly. “No, absolutely not. It’s nothing at all.”

 

“It  _is_ ,” Niall says firmly. “I know it is, Li. Listen.” He catches Liam by the bicep, forcing him to stop. Harry stops too.

 

“Niall, I don’t – ” Liam begins.

 

“Shut it,” Niall tells him. “Listen up. This is my wedding, and it only happens once in a bloke’s lifetime, and I’m going to remember this weekend until I’m old and wrinkled and shouting at my teenage grandchildren to ‘ _turn down that log-pounding music_ ’. So it means everything in the world to me that you’re here, and that Zayn is here. It wouldn’t be the same without you.”

 

Liam blinks at him. And then he folds Niall into a slow hug, the kind you sort of crumple into, and Harry can see over Niall’s shoulder that Liam’s eyes are very, very slightly shiny.

 

“You’re not going to cry on me, are you?” Niall asks, not unkindly. Liam huffs out a laugh against his neck.

 

“I don’t think so, no.”

 

“So we’re good?” Niall tugs away enough that he can look Liam in the face.

 

“We’re always good,” Liam tells him.

 

“Excellent; that’s what I like to hear. Come on.” Niall slings one arm around Liam and the other around Harry. “The night is young and there’s an umbrella in my drink.”

 

\--

 

“See, if I’d been here, you would’ve had a legitimate bachelor party,” Louis says. He’s drinking out of a coffee carafe; right now, the ratio is about 2:1 in terms of vodka versus orange juice.

 

“I didn’t _want_ a bachelor party.” Niall’s nursing a Coke, the umbrella from his first mocktail tucked behind his ear.

 

“We had a get-together,” Harry puts in mildly, unoffended by Louis’ opinion of his performance as a thrower of bachelor parties. “We did a bit of a pub-crawl; saw a band Niall’s been into.”

 

“No strippers,” Louis points out.

 

“Men or women?” Harry asks, because he’s curious and because he likes to stir the pot.

 

“Women because I can grudgingly concede after years of trying to bring him over to the dark side that vaginas are Niall’s poison of choice; men because it makes Liam uncomfortable,” Louis replies promptly.

 

“Not sure how I feel about the word _vagina_ ,” Niall muses.

 

“Oh, it’s too late for that,” Harry says, grinning.

 

“Think about it, though,” Louis urges. “No trying to marry Niall off to a hooker. No almost getting arrested. No abysmal hangover while you pieced together what happened the night before by text messages you sent and pictures you took while you were blackout.” He shakes his head. “What kind of send-off into married life is that, I ask you?”

 

“I don’t drink, mate,” Niall reminds him mildly.

 

“I know. But I will be disappointed in the rest of you until the day I _die_.”

 

Niall grins. “Speaking of not drinking.” Leaning across, he prods Liam’s shoulder.

 

Liam mumbles something unintelligible, his face buried in his arm.

 

Niall snickers. “Down for the count.”

 

“He looks _twelve_ ,” Harry says, delighted.

 

“We should draw on his face,” Louis decides.

 

“Oh, cut him some slack,” Niall objects, laughing, but Louis and Harry are already off their chairs, hunting around in the kitchen drawers for a sharpie. He’s starting to wonder if it was a wise decision for the general well-being of the planet to bring the minds of Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson together.

 

“Found one!” Louis announces moments later, post-its and rubber bands from the junk drawer scattered all over the counter.

 

“He’s only got the one kidney,” Niall protests, but he hasn’t moved off his chair or made any attempt to stop them, so Harry gives him a manic grin and they begin pencilling in a handlebar mustache.

 

“I had nothing to do with this,” Niall tells no one in particular.

 

“Guilty by association,” Louis informs him cheerfully, outlining a cock and balls on Liam’s cheek.

 

“Oh, shit – ” Niall blurts out, as something occurs to him. “Cut it out.”

 

“You’re harshing my mellow, Niall,” Louis tells him, until Niall slips off his chair and jerks the marker out of Louis’ fingers. Louis doesn’t even have time to protest before Niall is telling him why:

 

“ _Zayn’s_ coming tomorrow.”

 

Louis looks like he’s not sure what that means, but Harry’s eyes widen as he cottons on.

 

“Oh. _Shit.”_

 

“Oh, shit,” Niall agrees.

 

“He’s going to have – ”

 

Harry indicates the markings on Liam’s face, and Niall nods. “Yeah.”

 

“When he meets –  ”

 

“Yep.”

 

“For the first time in – ”

 

“Two years.”

 

“Ah.”

 

“Yes.”

 

The two of them stare at one another.

 

“Who’s Zayn?” Louis asks.  
  


\--

 

Liam wakes up before he wants to, and even as the sunlight streaming in through the window drags him back to consciousness, his mind is kicking and screaming and trying to flee back into the dark.

 

“Nggh,” he groans, turning his face away from the window to bury it in the pillow.

 

Unfortunately, the pillow is full of suffocatingly thick, curly hair, and Liam almost chokes on it before he tries to shift his entire body back away from it.

 

Harry’s arms tighten around his waist.

 

“Argh,” Liam groans again.

 

“S’that mean, ‘Harry, your hair is in my mouth and as luscious as it is, I’d like it out’?” Harry mumbles, his voice pitched low and raspy with sleep.

 

Liam mutters something that might be “ _Haz_ ”, and Harry takes pity on him and lets him go.

 

Liam buries his face in the pillow this time and wills himself to go back to sleep, but the edge is much too sharp on his headache, and he really, really has to pee.

 

“Haz,” he mumbles, attempting proper words for the first time. “Haz, need drugs.”

 

“Mmm.” Liam can tell that Harry is looking at him, but Liam refuses to open his eyes. “You can’t have drugs, Liam.”

 

“But I _want_ drugs,” Liam moans.

 

“You only have the one kidney,” Harry points out, and he sounds amused. “You already siphoned poison through it in the past twelve hours. It doesn’t want to do more work right now, I‘m fairly sure.”

 

“Grrgghh.” Liam flops onto his back and drags the cool side of the pillow over his face. “Want water, then.”

 

Harry hums, and a moment later, Liam feels the mattress shift as he climbs out of bed. “Only because you’re going to kill me when you see your face,” Harry says faintly from the en-suite bathroom.

 

Liam doesn’t bother to make sense of that at the moment. He wants to _die_.

 

“Here.” Harry pulls the pillow gently away from his face, and Liam drags himself upright, accepting the glass of water gratefully. Harry sits on the edge of the bed, watching him with a grin tugging at his lips. Liam ignores it as he drains the entire glass.

 

“What time is it?” Liam asks, resting his head back against the headboard and closing his eyes. He doesn’t feel human. Not yet. But the water helps.

 

“Half nine,” Harry replies, glancing across at the alarm clock on his side of the bed.

 

“It’s too early in the day to be feeling like this,” Liam groans. “At least twelve more hours to go until it’s dark out again and I can _sleep._ ”

 

“We’ll get you pulled together,” Harry promises. “Another glass of water and a shower and you’ll feel good as new.”

 

“I _doubt_ that.” Liam squints at Harry, his whole face screwing up in displeasure at having to open even one eye. “How come _you’re_ not hungover?”

 

“I didn’t drink as much as you think,” Harry replies, not the least bit fazed by the accusatory tone in Liam’s voice. “As soon as Lou dug out the _carafe_ to mix drinks in, I knew there’d have to be someone around to reign in the madness. Niall just watches and laughs.”

 

“Huh.” Liam mulls this over for about a second and then thrusts out the water glass again. “Another.”

 

Harry accepts the glass and obligingly disappears into the bathroom.

 

“There’ll be breakfast in a bit,” Harry tells him, over the sound of running water.

 

Speaking of running water.

 

Liam still really has to pee.

 

Hauling himself upright, Liam stumbles to the bathroom, tosses up the toilet seat, and jerks down his zipper.

 

“It looks different than I remember it,” Harry announces, mid-way through.

 

Liam doesn’t even glance at him. “Stop watching me pee.”

 

“Stop peeing where I’m watching,” Harry returns. “I was here first.”

 

Liam ignores him, flushes the toilet, and drags himself along the wall to the sink to wash his hands. He’s halfway through, soaping up, when he happens to glance up at the mirror.

 

And blinks.

 

Blinks again.

 

“Why is there… a cock and balls… on my face?”

 

“About that,” Harry begins.

 

“Is this your cock and balls?” Liam demands, poking the appropriate spot on his cheek.

 

“You don’t want my cock and balls on your face; you’ve told me that many times,” Harry replies, straight-faced.

 

“ _Did you draw this on me?_ ” Liam hisses, and he is _not_ amused. In fact, there is a little spark of panic in his eyes that Harry hasn’t often seen.

 

“I may have helped,” Harry hedges. “But to be fair, when I did it, I’d forgotten that Zayn was coming today – ”

 

Liam’s entire face spasms, and he turns back to the mirror. “Oh God.”

 

“Liam,” Harry begins, placating, because he knows when to stop taking the piss and to start being helpful, but Liam isn’t even listening.

 

“I’m hungover.”

 

“Liam,” Harry says again, patiently.

 

“And I’ve got a cock and balls on my face.”

 

“Liam.”

 

“And Zayn is _coming today._ ”

 

“ _LIAM._ ”

 

Liam does make eye contact then, but only in the mirror; he doesn’t turn around, apparently too horror-struck to tear his eyes away from the travesty on his face for long.

 

“We can fix this,” Harry promises. “Look – get in the shower, yeah? Scrub your face. Zayn’s not due ‘til the afternoon. Louis and Brooke are downstairs now, making a nice breakfast, and we’re going to eat it and feel better. All right?”

 

“Yeah.” Liam hesitates, but then he nods, quickly. “Yeah.”

 

“I’ll be waiting right out here,” Harry reassures him. “Shout if you need anything.”


	3. In Which Zayn Makes Liam Sick and Harry Tells a Sort-Of Love Story

Louis looks up as Harry shuffles into the kitchen, not sleepy-eyed enough to have just woken up.

 

“Morning,” Louis says with an enthusiastic wave.

 

Niall snorts into his bacon and eggs.

 

“You’re peppy,” Harry comments, pulling open the fridge and standing in front of it to scope out what’s in there, like every teenage boy since the dawn of time.

 

“Yes,” Louis agrees. “I was going to do ‘hungover’ but I opted for ‘gratingly cheerful’ instead. Do you like it?”

 

“Yeah, it makes a nice change,” Harry replies. “Wait ‘til you see our one-kidneyed princess.”

 

As though on cue, Liam drags himself into the kitchen, fresh from the shower. His hair is standing on end, and he’s wearing the track pants that he slept in and the first t-shirt he could find, which, judging by how tightly it fits around Liam’s midsection, is probably Harry’s.

 

“Abs,” Louis announces, in a tone that says _drop everything, emergency broadcast._

 

“Put those away; it’s too early for me to hate you,” Niall says amiably, around a mouthful of bacon.

 

Liam glances down at himself, and the action of dipping his head down and raising it again makes him grey in the face. He sits down on a bar stool in front of the counter, steadfastly not looking at Niall’s breakfast, or the leftovers cooling on the counter.

 

“We really should have used a less permanent marker on your face,” Harry says apologetically. There is definitely still a shadow of a handlebar mustache, complete with accompanying male anatomy, on Liam’s skin.

 

Liam just buries his head in his arms.

 

“Aww,” Louis says, and it might legitimately sound sympathetic if he weren’t trying not to laugh. He reaches across the counter and pats Liam’s shoulder. “You look beautiful, ignore Harry.”

 

“Are we at Harry now, not ‘Styles’?” Harry inquires mildly, leaning his hip against the counter and biting into an apple.

 

“Yeah, but don’t push your luck,” Louis warns.

 

Harry grins around a mouthful of fruit. “Noted.”

 

Liam falls asleep at some point during the conversation and dozes through almost everything after that, not that he misses much anyway. It’s only when Niall says, “Is that a taxi?” that Liam raises his head groggily from his arms, blinking, because some gut instinct makes his head throb in warning.

 

“That _is_ a taxi,” Louis is saying, from where he’s peering through the curtains in the front room. “Does anyone know a surly-looking possible-model in a leather jacket?”

 

Liam blanches. Niall looks at him in alarm, patting him on the shoulder.

 

“You going to survive there, Li?”

 

Liam looks, if possible, more nauseous than before. Pushing himself to his feet, he stumbles out of the kitchen and into the hall.

 

Louis is shaking hands with Zayn just inside the front door, his free hand on Zayn’s upper arm like they’ve known each other a long time. Zayn looks – he looks  _good_. He’s picked up a little bit of muscle across those shoulders; not much, but enough that it stretches his leather jacket in a way that makes warmth pool under Liam’s heart. He would know that profile anywhere, those fine lines and angles of Zayn’s face, and even the way he’s  _standing_ , one knee a little bent, legs spread slightly –  _I own the universe_  – is achingly familiar.

 

Zayn seems to realize he’s being watched, and he turns at once to look.

 

Liam drops his hands on his knees and vomits on the floor.

 

“Oh – god.” Louis is coming toward him, but Niall gets there first, an arm tightly around Liam’s shoulders. Liam’s chest is heaving, and he’s grateful for the help or he’s pretty sure he’d be on his knees in that pool of vomit by now and just the  _thought_  makes him retch again.

 

“Easy, Li, easy,” Niall is saying, guiding him around the mess and toward the stairs.

 

“What’s wrong with him?” He hears Zayn say, distantly.

 

“He had the odd drink last night,” Louis replies. “Nothing a little sleep and a lot of water won’t fix.”

 

“You let him drink?” Liam chooses not to analyze the oddly scandalized note in Zayn’s voice. “He has  _one kidney_.”

 

“He can drink if he wants to,” comes Harry’s voice, from somewhere back beyond the mess. “He’s an adult.”

 

Liam is most of the way up the stairs by now, so he can’t be sure, but he  _thinks_  he hears Zayn say, almost derisively, “Liam’s been an adult since he was twelve. It's not necessarily an indication of good judgment.”

 

And Liam wants to go down there and get into it with him, because Zayn doesn’t get to act like a  _dick_ , not after everything that’s happened, not after two years of no contact that  _weren’t Liam’s fault_ , but Niall’s guiding him across the landing to a bedroom, and Liam decides to lie down right now instead.

 

\--

 

“So explain to me the whole situation with Liam and the model,” Louis says, sitting under a newly-unfolded table and trying to jam the cross-pieces straight so that it will stop sagging on one side. Wedding-related paraphernalia collapsing in on itself is starting to become a worrisome trend.

 

“He used to be a model,” Harry corrects. “Now he’s doing the whole starving artist thing.”

 

“I thought he went to uni with you and Niall,” Louis says.

 

“He did. Help me with this.”

 

Louis scrambles out from under the table and crosses to Harry, who is trying to get a wooden table flipped on its back so he can unfold the legs.

 

“The rest of us went to uni and tried to find ourselves for awhile and then became adults,” Harry explains. “Zayn went to uni, but he did everything else in the exact reverse.”

 

Louis looks back up toward the house, where Niall is sitting in the grass with Brooke, putting together wedding favours like an assembly line. Zayn is standing nearby, smoking, although he doesn’t appear to be contributing much in terms of overall productivity.

 

“Yeah, he seems like type,” Louis acknowledges. “So whose fault is it really? This tiff with Liam?”

 

Harry shrugs. “Both, I s’pose.”

 

Louis looks at him, clearly waiting for the story, and Harry gives in and collapses onto the grass. It’s a beautifully sunny day and he doesn’t want to work that hard anyway, co-best man or not.

 

“Right, so, I don’t know who started it, but one of them had a bit of a thing for the other,” Harry begins.

 

“A romantic thing?” Louis asks.

 

“Yeah, yeah. A romantic thing. And then the other one started to reciprocate the feeling at some point.”

 

Louis leans back on his hands next to Harry. “So far, so good.”

 

“You’d think,” Harry agrees. “Except that they were best friends.”

 

“I don’t see how that’s a problem,” Louis says.

 

“Well, suppose you had a best friend,” Harry explains. “Someone you liked best of all and you didn’t want to scare them off. And then you developed romantic feelings for that best friend, who inconveniently was also very, very straight.”

 

“To be honest, I’d probably stick my hands in his trousers and double-check that hypothesis,” Louis admits.

 

“Yeah, you would, wouldn’t you.” Harry grins and nudges him. “But Zayn wouldn’t. Liam had sort of begun casually seeing Danielle by then as well, so that complicated things.”

 

“Why didn’t Liam make a move?” Louis asks. “He seems like the solid, dependable first-move type.”

 

“Because they were roommates,” Harry replies, “so Liam knew that Zayn brought home different blokes every weekend. He didn’t think he stood a chance.”

 

“This is starting to get depressing,” Louis says. “Someone should have just stuck their hands in someone else’s trousers.”

 

“I agree,” Harry answers, “but down into the deep, depressing disaster that is Zayn and Liam’s relationship we go. Unless you want me to stop.”

 

“No, no,” Louis says at once. “It’s like watching a train wreck; once you start watching, you have to see it through.”

 

“Excellent.” Harry seems to be relishing the opportunity to try out his storytelling skills. “So one night, Liam got terrifically smashed, mostly thanks to Niall.”

 

“Niall had a knack for that,” Louis agrees.

 

“And he came home – I mean, he went back to his room, and Zayn was there.”

 

“Was Zayn smashed as well?” Louis inquires.

 

“Conflicting eyewitness accounts,” Harry replies. “Anyway. Either Zayn was smashed or he wasn’t, but the point is that Liam was, so when Zayn kissed him, Liam didn’t think about Danielle or anything right away; he sort of let it happen.”

 

“Well, yeah.” Louis is looking across the lawn at Zayn, who is reclining in the grass now, head tipped back in the sun. “He had eyes, hadn’t he?”

 

“Exactly. So kissing led to a bit of something else – ”

 

“ _Did_  it?”

 

“I don’t know exactly what,” Harry admits, and Louis leans back, disappointed. “If you try to talk to Zayn about it, he casually asks you to fuck right off. And you must know how Liam is; when you ask him about that kind of thing, he gets red and spluttery and leaves out all the good details.”

 

“Doesn’t he know that when he does that, I’m left to make up the details in my mind?” Louis complains.

 

“It’s Liam,” Harry points out, amused. “Whatever he gets up to in bed, it’s probably very vanilla.”

 

“You never know,” Louis argues. “Sometimes it’s exactly his type that’s a sex maniac behind closed doors.”

 

“True.” Harry grins. “Picture it like that, then. Where was I?”

 

“Liam Payne, Sex Maniac, was doing wicked things to Zayn Malik, Struggling Artist.”

 

“Not at that time,” Harry counters. “At that time, he was studying literature.”

 

“‘Zayn Malik, Literature Major’ is less sexy,” Louis replies.

 

Harry’s lips twitch. “So Liam – ”

 

“The Sex Maniac,” Louis supplies.

 

“Yeah, Liam the Sex Maniac, he realizes about halfway through – ”

 

“Halfway through what?” Louis demands.

 

“I’ve told you, I don’t know,” Harry replies, throwing up his hands.

 

“Halfway through deep-throating Zayn Malik, Struggling Artist,” Louis decides.

 

Harry’s shoulders are shaking with laughter. “If you’d like. So halfway through that, Liam realizes what he’s doing.”

 

“Deep-throating his best mate, you mean,” Louis says. “While his phone is buzzing madly, because Danielle is texting him.”

 

“Do you want to tell the story?” Harry demands.

 

“I think I should, it’s more interesting when I tell it!”

 

“Well, he realizes halfway through that he’s probably making a mistake,” Harry continues, ignoring him.

 

Louis shakes his head. “If I had a nickel for every time I’ve had that thought…”

 

“Well, if Liam had a nickel for every time he’s had that thought, he would have exactly one nickel,” Harry tells him. “Because he doesn’t do one-night stands, and he especially doesn’t do male one-night stands.”

 

"Really closing himself off to new experiences on that one," Louis says.

 

Harry gives a dramatic sigh. "That's our Liam for you."

 

“So he realized he was making a mistake,” Louis prompts. “Then what?”

 

“He freaked out a bit,” Harry replies. “Sort of went off on Zayn, about how he had a girlfriend and he had to be more responsible and he wasn’t about to be one of Zayn’s famous one-night stands.”

 

“That’s a bit unfair,” Louis protests. “It’s not Zayn’s fault that Liam is a Sex Maniac.”

 

“But it’s true that Zayn had a lot of one-night stands,” Harry says. “And it’s also true that he made the first move. Liam thought that Zayn was just out to have a bit of fun, and never mind the consequences.”

 

“Stupid,” Louis pronounces.

 

Harry shrugs. “Well, it happened. So once Liam passed out – ”

 

“From all the Sex Maniacking he’d been doing,” Louis puts out.

 

“From all the  _alcohol_ ,” Harry corrects. “Zayn left, which was exactly what Liam had expected him to do so it didn’t exactly serve to change Liam’s perception of things.”

 

“Well, of course Zayn left – Liam shouted at him and left him to finish himself off,” Louis objects.

 

“Yeah, but if he’d stayed, then Liam would’ve seen he was serious about it and they could’ve talked when everyone involved was sober,” Harry points out. “But Zayn put in for a room transfer the next morning and didn’t speak to Liam for the rest of the semester.”

 

“And that’s  _it_?” Louis demands. “That’s how they left things?”

 

“Basically,  _yeah_ ,” Harry answers.

 

“And you let them?!”

 

“Well.” Harry rolls his neck, tilting his head to one side, then the other. “Niall and I were sort of hell on wheels in those days, yeah? We were so used to Liam and Zayn being the responsible ones that when they fell apart, we didn’t quite know what to do at first.”

 

“Oh.” Louis considers this. “Like children of divorce.”

 

“Yeah.” Harry shoots him a little smile. “Liam and Zayn got divorced and Niall and I were adrift. Eventually Liam moved in with Danielle and Zayn graduated and so whenever we hung out with them, it was always separately. There was never a chance to try to mend the damage.”

 

Louis hums, mulling all of this over. “We should help them out,” he decides at last.

 

“Should we?” Harry glances over at him, surprised.

 

“Of course we should.” Louis lifts his chin, indicating Zayn, who is serving the purpose of being a ridiculously attractive lawn ornament while Niall periodically throws things at him for being so useless. “Look at him. He’s miserable.”

 

“He always looks like that,” Harry says mildly.

 

“ _Liam_  is miserable,” Louis continues, like Harry hasn’t spoken.

 

“Liam isn’t miserable,” Harry interrupts. “I’ve  _seen_  Liam miserable. This is more…”

 

“Existing?” Louis supplies. “Existing doesn’t equal  _happy_ , Harold.”

 

“What did I do to earn  _Harold_?” Harry demands.

 

Louis leans forward and taps Harry’s knee. “Where’s Danielle?”

 

“What?”

 

“Where’s Liam’s girlfriend?” Louis repeats. “She’s missing the wedding of one of his best mates? Why? Does that seem like the image of a couple happily in love?”

 

 “Granted, it doesn’t,” Harry admits.

 

“Aha.” Louis points at him. “You’re coming around.”

 

“I’m still not sure we should plot against them,” Harry replies.

 

“We’re not plotting against them, we’re plotting on their  _behalf_ ,” Louis says, spreading his hands. “If we don’t, they’ll die alone.”

 

Harry laughs. “That’s fairly dire.”

 

“Yes. Yes it is.” Louis scrambles to his feet, a man on a mission, and holds out a hand to help Harry up. “Come on. We have work to do in the name of  _love_.”

 

“But the tables first, yeah?” Harry lets Louis pull him to his feet. “Otherwise Niall will murder us and we’ll die alone as well, somewhat earlier than scheduled.”

 

“Oh, don’t worry,” Louis says, a gleam in his eye. “I have an idea.”


	4. In Which Zayn is Kind of a Dick but Really, He Means Well

Niall looks up when a shadow falls over them. Brooke doesn’t even pause in counting out name cards.

 

“Hi, Harry,” she says.

 

“How goes?”

 

She frowns. “Thirty-six… thirty-seven… good. How go the tables?”

 

“Still got a few to go,” Harry remarks. “I was thinking that someone needs to go check on Liam, though.”

 

“Yeah, he was looking a bit rough when I put him to bed,” Niall agrees.

 

“I’d go, but the tables are a two-man job,” Harry says, indicating Louis, who is putting on a great show of trying to tip a table upright on his own. “And you’ve got to finish your wedding favours.”

 

“Yeah, he does,” Brooke mutters, and at the sound of that, Niall guiltily begins snipping off lengths of ribbon again.

 

“What’s Zayn doing?” Harry asks innocently.

 

Niall snorts. “Nothing.”

 

“I just got here,” Zayn complains, his voice faint from where he’s lounging in the grass, twenty feet away. “Leave me alone.”

 

“You could help,” Niall points out, for what’s definitely not the first, second, or even third time today.

 

“Yeah, but I don’t want to.”

 

Harry shades his eyes and gazes at him. “Zayn, I need a favour.”

 

“No,” Zayn says at once.

 

“It’s just a small favour.”

 

“I know what it is; I can hear you talking from here, you know. And the answer is no.”

 

Harry gets that determined look in his eye that makes Niall shake his head, and strolls across the grass toward him. “Zayn. Be a peach. Go and take the tiniest peek at Liam for me.”

 

“He threw up at the  _very sight of me_ ,” Zayn says flatly.

 

“He threw up because he drank his body weight in light beer and he’s only got one kidney,” Harry corrects. He injects as much concern into his tone as humanly possible. “That last part is the one I’m worried about, frankly.”

 

Zayn falters. “He doesn’t want me to see him like that.”

 

Harry gets down on one knee next to Zayn and plucks the aviators off his face. “He could be dying  _right now_.”

 

“Not likely,” Zayn mutters, snatching his sunglasses back, but he sits up.

 

“Just go, would you?” Brooke calls. “I need Harry to work. You’re distracting him.”

 

“The gods have spoken,” Harry says, with an apologetic shrug that’s totally at odds with his wicked grin. He springs lightly to his feet and starts off back across the grass. Zayn watches him go for a moment in wordless outrage.

 

“I’ll hold you down and shave your head,” he calls.

 

“Sounds kinky,” Louis remarks brightly from further away.

 

Harry makes a heart shape by pressing his thumbs and knuckles together and spins a one-eighty so he can look at Zayn while walking backward. “Always in my heart, Zayn Malik.”

 

Zayn makes a hand gesture of his own, albeit less polite. When he glances at Niall, the latter ducks his head down over his work and steadfastly does  _not_  grin.

 

\--

 

Zayn raises a hand to give a one-knuckled knock on the door, second-guesses himself, and paces away for a moment. He wonders whether he should just go in; if Liam’s sleeping, Zayn can just check on him and leave. But what if he’s not sleeping? What if he’s doing something else? What if he’s got the sheets tangled around his hips, head thrown back, tendons in his arm standing out stark against his skin –

 

Zayn has walked in on Liam jerking off precisely one time in his life, and he could write a Steinbeck novel about it.

 

Not that any of that is relevant to anything anymore. He just needs to go in, check on Liam, and then go back and shove it in Harry’s and Niall’s faces that this isn’t a big deal.

 

Before he can overthink it, Zayn raps on the door, waits a decent three to five seconds, and then pushes it open.

 

It turns out that he needn’t have worried, because Liam is fast asleep, chest rising and falling gently under that practically fucking _painted on_ shirt that has to belong to Harry. Zayn shakes the thought off and takes another step into the room, not even entirely sure what he’s doing, because he can see that Liam’s alive and well and that was the whole point of this excursion, wasn’t it?

 

A jingle sounds from nearby, and Zayn nearly jumps out of his skin. _Trust Liam to keep the factory-setting ringer._ He freezes, not even sure why he’s worried about Liam waking up and seeing him in here, but Liam’s breathing only hitches for a second and then settles again. Zayn relaxes and looks around for the phone that made the sound. Spotting it when he gets closer to the bed, where it’s tucked just under the edge of Liam’s ribs, he reaches out and tugs it gently free. Liam never used to have any secrets from him. Zayn feels a mix of spite, glee, and shame as he slides to unlock and discovers that there’s not even a password.

 

_From: Dani_

_this is like the 9 th text i’ve sent this morning liam. just tell me where you left your keys christ the new tenants are coming this afternoon._

 

Zayn frowns. _The new tenants?_

 

He doesn’t even hesitate; flipping past the first message, he goes into their message history. The last one from Liam is dated yesterday afternoon, simply saying that he’s arrived at Niall’s. The next eleven messages are a one-sided conversation that Danielle is apparently having with herself.

 

_great you didn’t get lost. :)_ _  
_

_liam remember when i asked you to leave your keys on the hall table before you left. did you do that._

_liam i need those keys. where did you put them._

_if you took them with you i’m going to lose my mind._

_i can’t find your keys liam, what the hell._

There are a few more variations of the same, up until the last two that arrived before the initial one Zayn had read.

 

_you’re the most irresponsible person._

_gonna be happy when i don’t have to deal with this anymore, i can fucking tell you that._

 

Zayn frowns. None of this makes any sense; from what he’s heard, Liam and Danielle have an ace flat that overlooks the water, a lucky find because it sits above a night club so the rent is surprisingly low. The tone of the messages is new, too; Danielle has never exactly been sugary sweet, but there’s a total lack of warmth in these texts that doesn’t exactly have a couple-in-love vibe. Zayn doesn’t think it’s just his own personal bias against Danielle that’s making him see it that way, either.

 

He glances at Liam, who has not moved. There’s a comic-looking shadow of something on his upper lip – marker? – and it stirs something in Zayn that makes him flip to Liam’s contacts and make a quick edit. He’s just finishing when Liam moans something in his sleep and stirs, so Zayn gently sets the phone down on the bedside table and leaves.

 

\--

 

Brooke claps her hands together. “T minus two days until the wedding,” she announces.

 

“Niall, there are still at least eight busses out of town between now and then,” Louis says. “Quick! I’ll cause a distraction.”

 

“Do you know how to cause only one distraction at a time?” Brooke asks, raising an eyebrow.

 

Louis claps a hand to his chest. “Right in the heart, Brooksy.”

 

Brooke grins, drumming her fingers on the table. “I was going to aim lower but it was such a _tiny target_."

 

Niall cracks up. Louis glares at him in mock outrage. “Whose side are you on, Horan?”

 

 “The side with boobs,” Brooke answers for him.

 

“Point,” Niall agrees.

 

“You win this round,” Louis mutters, and Harry grins from the end of the table.

 

“So, we’ve still got a lot to do,” Brooke says, as though Louis never led the conversation on a merry detour. "I'm going to hand out task lists.”

 

“Wonderful!” Louis claps his hands together. “ _Tasks_.”

 

“We love tasks,” Harry says amiably.

 

Niall snickers.

 

As Brooke’s coming around the table, putting sheets of paper down in front of them, Zayn leans over and eyes Liam’s.

 

“Hey. How come Liam’s is so much shorter than mine?”

 

“Several reasons,” Brooke replies, even as Liam ignores them both, still looking under the weather. He’s got his forehead resting in the bracket of one hand, staring dully at the table. “The first is that he’s not feeling well.”

 

“His fault,” Zayn points out at once, sounding miffed.

 

“You’ve _been_ drinking with my fiancé and his step-brother, yes? One shot always turns into six. You have to have super-powers _not_ to get pissed." Brooke waves a hand. "Anyway, look at him. He looks like a puppy that thinks it might die and that pulls on my heartstrings. You… look too much like one of those blokes who makes a fuss when someone else borrows his guy-liner.”

 

Zayn folds his arms and gives her a look.

 

“The second reason why your list is longer,” Brooke continues, ignoring Zayn’s death glare and pausing to drop a kiss on the top of Niall’s head as she passes by, “is that you were of no help at all this morning and I’m vindictive.”

 

“You’re not vindictive,” Niall declares at once.

 

“I’m a little bit vindictive,” Brooke says. “But thanks, sweetie. And the third reason is that – ”

 

“Oh, God,” Liam says suddenly, head bent over his phone.

 

Five heads swivel in his direction, as it’s the first thing he’s said since he came downstairs twenty minutes ago.

 

“All right?” Harry asks carefully.

 

“I must’ve been _really_ drunk last night,” Liam says, his voice suddenly muffled by his hands, in which he’s buried his face.

 

“Well, yeah; you passed out and we drew a cock on your face,” Louis reminds him.

 

“No, but, I – ” Liam sounds like he doesn’t know how to get the words out.

 

“Did you drunk text someone you shouldn’t have drunk texted?” Niall guesses.

 

“I changed Danielle’s name to ‘That Raving Bitch’ in my phone,” Liam says in a small voice.

 

There’s a silence.

 

Then Zayn snorts so hard that it sounds like it hurts, and Harry slowly grins.

 

“ _Is_ she a raving bitch?” Louis asks with interest. “Is that an accurate way to denote her in your mobile?”

 

“I think that’s a bit strong,” Liam says, still in that tiny, ashamed voice.

 

“You didn’t mean to,” Harry says, still grinning. “You were slurring your words by nine-thirty.”

 

“Maybe he did mean to,” Zayn says, leaning back in his chair now and looking deeply amused.

 

“Well, I don’t typically go around calling my _girlfriend_ a raving bitch,” Liam replies, because if anyone can put that rigid, defensive edge in Liam’s tone, it’s Zayn.

 

“Even when she’s acting like one?” Zayn asks lightly.

 

“How would you know the first thing about how my girlfriend acts?” Liam asks, raising his head from his hands to give Zayn a hard look.

 

"Here we go," Niall mutters.

 

Zayn raises his hands in mocking surrender. “I don’t. But since you showed up alone, got absolutely smashed, and changed her named to ‘That Raving Bitch’ in your phone, I’m going to use my impressive intellectual abilities to deduce that things aren’t going well.”

 

“You don’t know the first thing,” Liam snaps. “You don’t know the _first thing_ about it.”

 

Liam is as mild-mannered as they come; Zayn takes an odd sort of pride in being able to drag this side of him out so quickly.

 

“I don’t have to,” Zayn replies. “I know _you_.”

 

“ _Do_ you?” Liam demands. “Did you know I got engaged last fall?”

 

Something flits across Zayn’s face – surprise? _Hurt?_ (If that’s even a possibility; Liam doesn’t think it is but he used to be able to read Zayn so well) – that’s gone as quickly as it arrives. His lip curls. “Did you get down on one knee, Liam? Was it _romantic?_ Were the stars out and the fucking _birds_ singing – ”

 

“Yeah,” Liam interrupts. “Yeah, it was just like that.”

 

“Can I – ” Harry begins, but Zayn cuts in, his eyes never leaving Liam’s.

 

“Did you spend three months’ salary on the ring? Did she tell you it was the biggest diamond she’d ever seen?”

 

Something inside Liam seems to crack. He fumbles in his pockets for a moment. “Did you want to have a look for yourself?”

 

Slamming something down on the table with a sound like a coin striking wood, Liam yanks his hand back like whatever it is has burned him.

 

There’s an elegant white-gold engagement ring sitting on the polished oak.

 

Zayn doesn’t know why his heart does what it does – Liam _would_ pick this ring, Zayn would have picked it out of a hundred others as the one that Liam would choose, and he has no idea why except that he just _knows_ – but he drives the feeling down where it can’t get to him.

 

“Oh, Liam,” Louis says, for once not taking the piss.

 

“When did she give it back…?” Harry begins at the same time.

 

Liam shakes his head, lips pressed together. “It doesn’t matter.” He glances down the table briefly. “I’m sorry, Brooke. I don’t want to ruin your wedding.”

 

He pushes his chair back so gently that it’s almost worse than if he’d overturned it. Zayn watches him go and wishes he still remembered how to talk to his best friend. 


	5. In Which Niall Uses His Manipulation Skills For the Good of Mankind

Niall pokes Zayn in the side. “Stop thinking so much. I can hear you from here.”

 

The sun’s been gone for nearly an hour, and Niall is lying on his back on the dock at the pond, fingers laced behind his head. Zayn has taken off his shoes and rolled his pants up to the knees so that he can put his feet in the water. Every now and again, there’s a faint rippling sound as Zayn aimlessly kicks his legs.

 

Behind them, up on the patio, Harry and Louis are working on their respective best man speeches. They’re too far away for Niall to hear what they’re saying, but he’s pretty sure that whatever it is they come up with will be suitably ridiculous.

 

Liam’s been in bed since dinner.

 

“I’m not thinking too much.” Zayn leans back on his hands, tilting his head up to look at the stars. He doesn’t bother to specify who he wants to talk about, but it’s not like he has to. “I always thought he’d get married first.”

 

“Yeah?” Niall is feeling relaxed and disinclined to giving long, involved answers, although that doesn’t mean he’s not listening

 

“Yeah. I mean, out of any of us, Liam is the settling down  _type._ ” Zayn sounds like he’s trying to work something out. “He seems like he’d want the white picket fence and the swing in the garden and the kids he’d have to take to football practice.”

 

“I think he does want all that,” Niall replies.

 

“Not badly enough that he decided to skip this weekend and try to salvage things with Danielle,” Zayn says, with a touch of scorn and maybe a little bit of something else, tucked away where Niall can’t quite see. It could be something that says: _Liam doesn’t salvage anything. He just walks away._ But more likely it’s resentment that Liam made sure it was Zayn who did the walking.

 

“Could be there wasn’t anything left to salvage,” Niall suggests, and maybe he’s got a little undercurrent of his own. “Could be he wants his white picket fence with someone else.”

 

Zayn snorts, but doesn’t argue. There’s a beat before he says, “What about you? Never thought you’d find one you liked and stick with her.”

 

“Nah, it’s the other way around, mate,” Niall says. “She found one  _she_  liked and stuck with  _me_.”

 

“Sap.” Zayn huffs in amusement.  “Uni-era Niall would be disgusted.”

 

“Uni-era Niall used to wake up under picnic tables two towns over,” Niall replies. “Modern-era Niall’s judgment is much better.”

  

Zayn laughs, properly laughs, for the first time since he arrived. “Sometimes I miss all of that. The hanging out and ignoring our coursework and doing stupid things.”

 

“You didn’t do any stupid things,” Niall points out. “You stood about and pretended to be mysterious while Harry and I did stupid things and Liam tried to talk sense to us.”

 

“I wasn’t _pretending_ to be mysterious,” Zayn says, biting down on a grin because Niall can’t be allowed to get away with this kind of slander. “I _was_ mysterious, thanks very much.”

 

“Oh, yeah,” Niall says, a ripple of laughter in his voice. “Yeah, like we had no idea that you were holed up in your room reading comic books for five days straight when you disappeared and wouldn’t tell us where you’d been. Like we also didn’t know you had a stack of David Bowie CD cases on your desk but the song with 2,500 plays on your iPod was Hollaback Girl.”

 

“Gwen Stefani is an under-appreciated genius,” Zayn protests.

 

“You’re embarrassing,” Niall informs him.

 

Zayn reaches back and swats at him. “How do you even know about that? I don’t go through _your_ iPod.”

 

“Yeah, but I don’t have any morals,” Niall replies, grinning. “Anyway, it was Liam who told us.”

 

Zayn tilts his head a little, eyes fixed on the stars again. It looks to Niall like maybe he’s still smiling, just a little, but it’s hard to tell from the angle of his profile.

 

“Yeah, I reckon Liam would know,” he says at last.

 

“You could just talk to him – ” Niall begins.

 

“I don’t want to talk to him,” Zayn replies at once.

 

“Not about all of – _that_ ,” Niall says, rolling his eyes. “Talk to him about everything since. Talk to him about Danielle.”

 

“He doesn’t want to talk to me about that,” Zayn says flatly, because if there’s one thing in this world he’s absolutely sure of, it’s that.

 

“He doesn’t want to talk to me about that, either,” Niall says. “But he ought to talk to _someone_ , yeah?”

 

Zayn doesn’t immediately respond.

 

Niall sighs. “He misses his best mate.”

 

“We’re not friends anymore.”

 

Niall snorts. “For someone who doesn’t care about Liam, you care a lot about what happens between him and Danielle.”

 

Zayn glances back sharply over his shoulder. “I don’t.”

 

Niall lifts one shoulder slightly, as much of a shrug as he can convey while lying on his back. “All right.”

 

Zayn pushes at his leg. “Now you’re just being a tosser.”

 

“I don’t want to fight with you, Bad Man.” Niall nudges Zayn back with his knee. “Only, it’s my wedding, and you sort of get to a point where you’re tired of the people you care about being blue.”

 

“I’m not blue, Ni,” Zayn says.

 

Niall shrugs again. “All right.”

 

They lapse into silence for a long moment, Zayn kicking at the water and Niall watching the stars.

 

“How long do you think I can go without telling Liam who really changed Dani’s name in his phone?” Niall asks eventually.

 

Zayn turns fully around to look at him, and his the combination of surprise, guilt, and indignation on his face gives him away. “Prove it.”

 

Niall grins. “Do I have to?” He sits up, lessening the distance between them, and from this close, Zayn can see the stars reflecting in his eyes.

 

It doesn’t make him look any less like a little shit.

 

“Don’t tell him,” Zayn warns. “You’ll make things worse.”

 

“Nah, mate; I’ll just be the messenger.” Niall pats him on the shoulder. “Go talk to him. I’ll think about keeping it to myself.”

 

Zayn gapes at him. “Everyone _said_ you’d gotten good at blackmail.”

 

“I quit drinking.” Niall winks. “Everyone needs a hobby.”

 

\--

 

“I think I should get to speak first,” Louis announces, “as I was best man first.”

 

“Yeah, but what if you say all the good parts?” Harry objects.

 

They are sitting on a swinging bench on the patio in the back garden. The sound of Niall’s laughter drifts up from the pond.

 

“Well, I really think the nature of our speeches will be different,” Louis says. “I knew him first, and longest, and he’s my step-brother, so naturally, my speech will be Oscar-worthy, devastatingly heartwarming and hilarious in turns, and at least forty minutes long.”

 

Harry nods along. “And my speech will be basically, ‘Niall, right? Enjoy being married I suppose’.”

 

“Exactly.”

 

They grin at one another.

 

“In all seriousness, though,” Louis says, and Harry’s grin widens, because he feels like he knows Louis well enough even after a mere two days to deduce that Louis is very infrequently _serious_ about anything, “I think I could talk about when his dad met my mum and we all sort of got together and became a family. That was big. I mean, I never knew my dad well, and then in comes Bobby Horan like he thinks I know what I’m supposed to do with a proper dad.”

 

“And you didn’t.”

 

“I actually didn’t,” Louis says, like this is revelatory. “I dropped a jam jar once and got strawberry jam all over myself and on the floor, and there was glass in it because the jar had shattered. Bobby _lifted_ me out of the mess – _lifted_ me, Curly, and I was nearly twelve – and set me on the counter and told me to stay back because he was going to clean it. He kept asking if I was all right.”

 

“Aww.” Harry smiles, fond. “He was keeping you safe.”

 

Louis’ eyes go wide and he nods in agreement. “My mum was always at work when I was a kid so I’d learned to clean up my own messes. I hadn’t a clue what all the fuss was about.”

 

“That _is_  kind of ridiculously heartwarming,” Harry admits. “I sort of thought you were joking about that.”

 

“Oh, no, I can be as heartwarming as they come,” Louis promises.

 

"Can you?"

 

"I can."

 

Harry leans back on his hands and smiles, just a flash of teeth. "Prove it."

 

“Would you like me to say something heartwarming about you?” Louis asks.

 

“Do you think you could?”

 

Louis scoffs. “I could say a million heartwarming things about you.”

 

Harry grins. “When you gloat about it, it gets less heartwarming.”

 

Louis gives his knee a good-natured shove. “Harry Styles,” he says, leaning forward. The sincere look he’s giving Harry prompts the latter to bite down on a grin. “My favourite things about you are your curls and your smell.”

 

“My _smell_?”

 

“Yes. Like soap and boy and department-store cologne. And from the moment I first saw you, I thought you had a lovely face.”

 

Harry’s mouth curls up in a slow, brilliant smile. “This face?”

 

“That very face,” Louis says, and he’s so close now that their foreheads are almost touching. “You’ve got a dimple. I’d like to make sure you’re aware.”

 

“I am aware, yes.”

 

“Well, then.” Louis leans back at once, and Harry’s _sure_ that he knows what he’s doing, creating proximity like that and then snatching it away, but he looks guileless. “Is your heart sufficiently warmed?”

 

Harry has to laugh. “It’s quite warm, thanks. Thank you for pointing out my dimple.”

 

“Every man should know his flaws, Harry,” Louis says seriously, and he holds up the pad of paper on which they’ve been (mostly unsuccessfully) attempting to write their best man speeches. On it, he’s drawn a stick figure with an abundance of curls and –

 

“Is that a birth mark on my face?” Harry asks, amused.

 

“I think you should get your eyes checked,” Louis tells him, straight-faced. “This is obviously a well-executed dimple.”

 

“It’s sort of attached to my eye, though,” Harry says, reaching for the drawing, which Louis holds firmly out of his reach. “Look, see, and I haven’t got a nose, I’ve just got eyes and a giant creepy mouth – ”

 

“You’re right, I’ve been remiss.” Louis turns his shoulder to block Harry’s hands from grabbing at the pad of paper. “Unhand me, you animal! I’m illustrating!”

 

“I’d just like a nose; I don’t feel that’s too much to ask.” Harry attempts to reach over Louis’ shoulder; Louis huddles further into the swing, scribbling furiously.

 

“All right, you heathen, I’ve drawn you a nose!”

 

“Show me,” Harry demands.

 

Louis twists around, and suddenly he’s on his back, Harry’s arms on either side of him, and he’s holding up the pad of paper between them like a shield.

 

Harry furrows his brow dramatically at the drawing. “That’s not a nose; that’s a triangle! And you haven’t fixed the creepy mouth!”

 

Louis makes an outraged expression. “This is an excellent mouth! This kind of mouth is all the rage in Paris! I’m painting you like one of my French girls and all you’ve got for me is ingratitude! It’s an affront to my artistic integrity, is what it is.”

 

Harry grabs the pad out of Louis’ hands and tosses it away. “ _That_ for your artistic integrity.”

 

“Oh? _Oh?_ ” Louis acts because Harry isn’t expecting it, flattening both palms on Harry’s ribs and pushing him up and off. Harry loses his balance and tumbles sideways, off the swing, but he throws out a hand and catches himself.

 

Louis is off the swing in an instant, one knee on either side of Harry’s hips, pen held high.

 

“You’re going to draw that hideous birthmark on me,” Harry realizes.

 

“Precisely.” The way Louis is grinning makes his whole face light up.

 

“But you can’t,” Harry says, catching the wrist that has the pen in it. He holds up his free hand, the one he caught himself with, and shows off a barely-there scrape on his palm. “I’m wounded.”

 

“You _are_ wounded,” Louis says, abandoning the pen at once and snatching Harry’s hand instead. Harry notices at once how small Louis' hands are; how even when it's Louis with his fingers curled around Harry's, Harry's hand almost hides his. Louis pulls the damaged hand toward him; Harry obligingly holds it up for inspection.

 

“Good god,” Louis says, looking up at Harry with wide eyes. “Are you sure you’ll _survive_?”

 

“I might be able to bravely press on,” Harry says solemnly.

 

Louis drops a kiss onto Harry’s palm, feather-light. “Better?”

 

Harry beams, a little helplessly. “Much.”

 

Louis sets Harry's hand down on his chest like it's something delicate and breakable and pushes himself to his feet. He's done it again, with the proximity and then the distance, and Harry wonders what that's about, and whether it's him specifically around whom Louis is like this or if it's more of a general thing. Maybe it's simply that Louis holds out on first moves or that he's waiting for Harry to do it, which Harry thinks he can definitely, definitely do. 

 

But then Harry's sitting up and Louis has retrieved the paper from where Harry tossed it away into the grass and Zayn and Niall's voices are getting nearer. Louis is chewing on the pen and saying, "I think we should put in a bit about how Niall's always been jealous of my good looks and charm", and the moment is gone.

 

So Harry makes it his mission to keep an eye out for the next one.


	6. In Which Zayn Apologizes and Louis Meets a Stranger

Zayn is out having a cigarette the next morning, leaning casually against the wall next to Niall’s front door and staying out of the sun. It’s early, yet, and normally Zayn’s is not a face anyone expects to see before three o’clock in the afternoon on a non-work day, but Louis and Harry woke everyone early when Harry attempted to teach Louis how to make pancakes and Louis set off the fire alarm four separate times.

 

Zayn’s decided to seize the day on that one, because Liam is already gone, room empty and bed made, when Zayn gets up to spew unkind words over the banister at Jamie Oliver and his clearly moronic assistant. Zayn still knows Liam, though, whether he wants to or not, and he’s pretty sure he knows exactly where Liam has gone. So he drags a hand through his hair in the hall mirror, trying to give it some semblance of style, and shuffles outside. He lights up a cigarette, and then a second, and a third as he waits.

 

His suspicions are proven right during his fourth and last cigarette when there’s a crunch of footsteps on the gravel, and Liam rounds the corner of the long driveway at a jog. He slows down to a walk when he gets close, checking the heart-rate monitor on his wrist even as he drags his upper arm across his forehead, the fabric of his t-shirt collecting some of the moisture that beads along his hairline.

 

He’s wearing baggy red basketball shorts, but the t-shirt is white and clinging to his skin from the sweat, and Zayn’s eyes narrow even as Liam pulls his leg up behind him in a quad stretch.

 

“Don’t know why the shirt you  _run_  in has to be so tight,” Zayn calls, maybe a little less snide and a little more something  _else_  than he meant it.

 

Liam doesn’t even look startled, switching legs. “Don’t know why you noticed.”

 

Zayn expels a puff of cigarette smoke and wonders when Liam changed, from the amiable basketcase – always fretting over his grades and what his friends were up to – with killer abs and puppy eyes, to whoever he is now.

 

From what Zayn can see, he’s still got the eyes and he's definitely got the abs. Just, some of that insecurity has gone away, and with it, some of the warmth, too.

 

Or maybe that’s just Zayn, because Liam still leans forward, eyes bright and fascinated, when Niall launches into an anecdote about Brooke, or laughs when Harry digs his knuckles into Liam’s side and says,  _Kidney shot! But don’t worry, it’s the gimp one._

 

So Zayn doesn’t really know. But he does know that he doesn’t get under Liam’s skin quite like he used to, back in the days when they shared a dorm room and Zayn used to wonder if them falling asleep together, Liam’s arm tucked around his chest, meant something  _more_  (and being almost sure, when he saw the answering light in Liam’s eyes in the morning, that it  _did_ ).

 

“Shouldn’t have gotten on your case yesterday,” Zayn says eventually, and Liam squints up at him from a side lunge.

 

“Is that an apology?”

 

Zayn just shrugs.

 

Liam goes back to his stretching. He finishes right around the time Zayn’s cigarette does, and Zayn tosses the butt away even as Liam drops into a series of push-ups.

 

Zayn thinks, out of nowhere:  _I wonder if he could carry me_ , and for some reason he will never be able to define, the thought is hardwired to that stutter of warmth in his belly that sends his mind  _fleeing_  in the opposite direction before his dick can figure it out.

 

“How many of those can you do?” Zayn asks, because it’s conversation, and maybe it’ll be distracting enough at the same time as it’s an excuse to stay outside now that his cigarettes are gone.

 

“A lot,” Liam replies shortly, not stopping.

 

“How many are you  _going_  to do?”

 

Liam does pause then, glancing up at Zayn with irritation. “Seriously?” His arms are still supporting his weight, strong but shaking a little by now, and Zayn steadfastly  _does not look._

 

Zayn shrugs again, languidly, and Liam goes back to his push-ups, forcing out little huffs of breath now on the down-stroke. Zayn leaves him to it for a long minute, before he says: “You’re different.”

 

Liam snorts, but doesn’t immediately reply, forcing out five more impossible-looking push-ups that have his lips pressed together and his whole body shaking.

 

Zayn doesn’t even imagine Liam straining over him like that. Not even a little bit.

 

“That’s what your fiancée kicking you out will do for you,” Liam says, settling back on his knees.

 

“What?” Zayn was paying attention to the thread of the conversation. He was.

 

Liam rolls his eyes. “You said I was different. I told you why.”

 

Zayn looks away, hands roving over his pockets like he thinks there might be a forgotten cigarette in there. “I didn’t know that yesterday.”  _When I brought it up,_  he doesn’t say.  _When I pushed._

 

“I know.” Out of the corner of his eye, Zayn can see Liam lifting the hem of his shirt to wipe down his face, and there’s a flash of lean, hard muscle before the fabric settles back into place again. “It’s fine.”

 

“Are you sure?” Zayn asks, and he turns back to watch him in time to see something unreadable flit across Liam’s face.

 

Liam laughs awkwardly. “Yeah. Pretty sure, Zayn.”

 

“Should we – ” Zayn begins, and he doesn’t know where it’s going, but it doesn’t matter anyway because Liam is climbing to his feet and passing him on his way to the front door.

 

“Good talk,” Liam says curtly, and then he vanishes inside.

 

Zayn watches him go and knows for sure that Liam has changed, because they both used to be much better at this.

 

\--

 

“Can you hold this for a second?” Harry asks, holding out the takeout bag that contains the breakfast they went into town to buy after practically destroying the Horans' kitchen.

 

“Sure,” Louis says, accepting it without thinking.

 

Harry tucks his hands into his pockets and beams. “Thanks.”

 

Louis rolls his eyes. “I shouldn’t have to carry; I  _paid._ ”

 

“Yeah, but, I have pipe-cleaner arms,” Harry says, flailing them around to demonstrate. Louis takes a step back to avoid losing an eye.

 

Louis gives him a  _look_. “Because mine are so beefy.” He resignedly switches the bag to his other hand so he can dig around in his pocket for his car keys.

 

“The other pocket,” Harry says helpfully.

 

Louis transfers the bag once again and reaches into the right pocket this time. “How did you know?”

 

“Your trousers are very, very tight,” Harry replies, still with that same helpful tone. “I can see the outlines of things in and around your pockets.”

 

Louis is pretty sure something goes down the wrong way, because he coughs, and the next thing he knows, Harry is dragging him down behind the nearest car and clapping a hand over his mouth.

 

Louis accidentally smacks the body of the car as he tries to get his balance, and the car alarm goes off at once. Harry’s enormous hand disappears from over his mouth, and Louis properly fits his coughing fit in now, realizing only when he’s reached the end of it that Harry is gone and there’s a woman standing over him, looking at him quizzically as she taps a button on her remote starter. The car alarm quiets at once.

 

“Are you going to live?” She asks, one hand on her hip, the other clutching the remote starter with an Audi keychain that – oh.

 

Louis withdraws his hand from where it’s still planted against the side of the Audi, and wonders instantly why he feels guilty since it’s  _Harry_  who got him into this and then pulled a vanishing act.

 

“Yeah,” he says, and his voice sounds scratchy and strained, so he coughs a couple more times to get that itch out of his throat.

 

“Why are you hiding behind my car?” The woman asks.

 

Louis looks down at his knees tucked up under him and realizes that he does, in fact, give the impression that he’s hiding.

 

“I’m not hiding,” he replies, because  _my step-brother’s friend dragged me back here and then disappeared into thin air_ sounds ridiculous. “I tripped and used your car to break my fall.”

 

The woman eyes him like she doesn’t believe him, but before Louis can embellish the truth some more, her gaze lands on the takeout bag.

 

“Is that from around here?” She asks. She sounds American, and Louis wonders what the hell she’s doing in the backwoods of Great Britain.

 

“Oh – yeah.” Louis climbs to his feet and jerks his head over his shoulder. “Right over there. Local place. My step-brother said it’s got the best chips in town.”

 

The woman snorts. “I’ll bet it’s got the only chips in town. Not much of a tourist destination, is it?”

 

Louis blinks at her. “Well, it’s a thriving metropolis of five thousand people, so.”

 

The woman nods, and she’s eyeing him again, but it’s different this time. “Are you local?”

 

Louis shakes his head. His bum smarts a little from the fall and he’s fairly confused and he’s apparently  _lost Harry_ , but he’s got part of his brain that doesn’t really know how  _not_  to flirt with tall blondes in tight jeans, even if they’re women. “Could be. Need help finding anything in particular?”

 

The woman smiles for the first time, scarlet lipstick over white teeth. “I’m here for a wedding, actually. I’m staying in a bed-and-breakfast tonight but I’ve been driving forever and I need a snack. I thought England was going to be, you know,  _smaller._ ”

 

“Keep your voice down, we’ve got a size complex.” Louis slides a thumb into the waistband of his jeans, just resting it there, and the woman’s eyes follow his hand. “You wouldn’t happen to be here for Niall Horan’s wedding, by any chance?”

 

The woman beams. “I  _am_ , yeah. How do you know him?”

 

“He’s my step-brother,” Louis tells her.

 

“Oh, wow! So you must be in the wedding party.”

 

Louis is about to answer her when his phone buzzes from somewhere, and both he and the woman look down.

 

“Can you even get that phone out of your pocket without taking your pants off?” The woman asks, and it’s not even flirtatious; she sounds genuinely curious and a little bit impressed.

 

In response, Louis makes an exaggerated face and wedges his fingers into the tightest pocket on earth, leaning back a little to give himself more space, and drags his phone free.

 

The woman laughs and applauds.

 

Louis takes a small, flourishing bow. “Do you mind?”

 

“Not at all,” the woman tells him. “It could be something to do with the wedding.”

 

Louis flashes her a grin and shades his hand over the screen of his phone to read the text.

 

_From: Harryyyy_

__

_STOP FLIRTING AND RUN AWAY._

 

Louis’ eyebrow rises.

 

“You look puzzled,” the woman says.

 

The phone buzzes again in his hand.

 

_From: Harryyyy_

__

_ILL KNOCK HER OUT AS A DISTRACTION._

 

Louis sighs, because he doesn’t understand what’s going on  _at_ all but for some reason this all seems so  _Harry_ , and texts back:

 

_Usually I don’t ask people to assault Americans for me until at least the second date._

 

Harry’s quick to reply.

 

_From: Harryyyy_

__

_I WILL LEAVE A MAN BEHIND IF I HAVE TO DO NOT EVEN THINK THAT IM JOKING._

 

Louis wedges his phone back into his pocket with a roll of his eyes and a smile for the woman’s benefit. “Just my friend,” he says by way of explanation. “He says he’s leaving without me if I don’t hurry up.”

 

“Well, it was nice meeting you,” the woman says, extending a hand, and Louis takes it and just holds it for a minute, in a way that makes the woman blush. “I’m sure I’ll see you at the wedding.”

 

“You will,” Louis agrees.

 

“I’ll introduce you to my boyfriend,” the woman says with a wink. “Unless you already know him. He’s the one who’s friends with Niall; I’m just coming as his date.”

 

“Oh?” Louis glances around, but he doesn’t see any movement and figures Harry isn’t driving away on him yet. “What’s his name?”

 

The woman’s smile brightens. “Harry Styles.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...Hahaha. Because clearly this story needed some Swifty.


	7. In Which Liam and Zayn Have a Spectacular Argument

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so very sorry this update took so long! I was writing another fic that got away from me, but we should be back to our regularly scheduled updates for this bad boy now. :)

Harry’s convertible jumps the curb as it squeals up next to Louis. The Audi is still visible in the distance, disappearing down a country road that’s in the exact opposite direction from the bed and breakfast.

 

Harry is wearing a beanie and sunglasses that appear to have materialized from nowhere.

 

“You’re highly strange,” Louis announces, hands on his hips.

 

“Possibly,” Harry says, one arm draped loosely around the headrest of the passenger seat. “Are you going to get into the car?”

 

“I don’t know if I can trust you,” Louis says. “You threw me at your girlfriend and left me to die.”

 

Harry sighs. “I know.  _Please_  get in the car?”

 

Louis frowns at him, but he does as he’s told. “What was that about? What are these – mad text messages about?  _I’ll knock her out to distract her_?”

 

“I think you’ll find that one was in all caps,” Harry says.

 

“Yeah, I’ve yet to receive a text from you that wasn’t, you raving psychopath.” Louis flips through his phone. “You said you would  _leave a man behind._ ”

 

Harry ignores Louis’ incredulous expression and shrugs. “I panicked?”

 

“ _Why?_ ”

 

“You talked to her!” Harry exclaims, as the car rolls out of the parking lot. “She’s mad.”

 

“She’s not mad,” Louis disagrees. “She was quite friendly.”

 

“She’s mad,” Harry says flatly. “When I told her it wasn’t working out, she wrote me a song.”

 

“That doesn’t sound so bad,” Louis offers.

 

“It’s called  _Harry Edward Styles Has Raging Crotch Warts_  and it’s got 1.8 million hits on YouTube.”

 

“Ah.” Louis tries to be straight-faced about this, since obviously Harry is unamused. “For clarification – ”

 

Harry looks indignant and resigned all at once. “I don’t have raging crotch warts.”

 

“That’s a positive development,” Louis notes. “All right, so if you told her it wasn’t working, why is she here?”

 

“I got the invitation for the wedding while we were still dating!” Harry rakes his hair out of his eyes, but ridiculous person that he is, there’s still an upturn to one side of his mouth. Louis likes to think it’s his company that puts that there, but it’s possible that Harry just has difficulty not smiling all the time in general. “I assumed she would know that the invitation was no longer standing if we were no longer seeing one another.”

 

“Yeah, about that,” Louis begins. “She didn’t call you her  _ex_ -boyfriend.”

 

Harry drops his head onto the steering wheel as the car idles at a stoplight. “Oh, god.”

 

Louis reaches across the car and squeezes his shoulder, stifling a laugh.

 

Harry turns his head just enough to glare at Louis despite the way his cheek is mashed into the steering wheel. “It’s not funny.”

 

“It’s a little funny.”

 

Harry does something that sounds like a strangely articulate “Argh.”

 

Louis is unashamedly grinning. “I’m very sympathetic.”

 

There’s a beat of silence.

 

“Harry,” Louis says presently.

 

Harry expels a breath against the steering wheel. It makes his curls flare away from his face. “What.”

 

“The light is green.”

 

Harry snorts. “Are there even any cars behind me?”

 

“No, but.” Louis shifts; reclines his seat and settles back with his hands laced behind his head. “Wake up and fulfill societal norms, will you?”

 

Harry sighs but does as he’s told.

 

“Listen.” Louis tilts his head slightly so that he can see Harry as the car rolls forward through the intersection. “Why don’t you make her want to break up with _you_?”

 

Harry looks like he hadn’t thought of that. “I’m no good at being a jerk, though.”

 

“Nah, you’re going about it the wrong way,” Louis turns his face up to the sun again, sunglasses reflecting the glare. “You have to convince her to break up with you, but you don’t want her to hate you. Or else, you know – more songs. _Harry Edward Styles Has a Hairy Bum, Harry Edward Styles Supports Nuclear Proliferation, Harry Edward Styles Owns a Nickleback Album –_ ”

 

“Good god.”

 

Louis nods seriously. “Yes, Harry. Nickleback.”

 

Harry looks wide-eyed and spooked and only half-joking about it. “So what do you suggest I do?”

 

“Let me think on it,” Louis says. “I’m absolutely positive I can come up with a solution.”

 

“That’s awfully confident.” The upturn is back, at the corner of Harry’s mouth.

 

Louis grins at the sky. “I’m an awfully confident man, Harry.”

 

“Where was she  _going?”_ Harry asks suddenly. “When she drove away? Isn’t that the road that turns into a dead end in the middle of nowhere?”

 

Louis blinks innocently. “Is it?”

 

Harry looks vaguely amused. “Didn’t you give her directions?”

 

“Yes. But I get turned around sometimes, you know.” Louis manages to look guileless when Harry knows perfectly well that  _guileless_  isn’t even something that’s ever been on Louis’ radar. “All this back country. It’s a culture shock.”

 

Harry’s mouth curls up into a slow Cheshire Cat smile. When they reach the corner, he flicks on the blinker and turns down the same way the Audi went.

 

“Where are we going?” Louis demands.

 

“You directed her into a bog. I just want to double-check that we won’t be wanted for manslaughter.”

 

“You do like her,” Louis accuses.

 

“I feel like we’re missing the distinction between liking someone and not wanting them to die alone in the wilderness,” Harry says.

 

Louis shakes his head loftily. “I only have the two settings.”

 

Harry glances at him with a smirk. “Which am I?”

 

“Oh, very definitely ‘die in the wilderness’,” Louis says seriously. “Except that your curls are very nice and haven’t done anything wrong, so it seems a bit unfair to banish them. Since the rest of you is attached to them, I suppose I have to take the lot.”

 

“How generous of you,” Harry replies, deadpan.

 

Louis sits up properly and peers through the windshield as they approach the back of the Audi, sunk down into the mud to the point where its wheels are spinning uselessly as the driver attempts to back it up and speed out. “Speaking of generosity, this detour we’re taking has given me an idea.”

 

Harry looks faintly alarmed about that.

 

\--

 

“Zayn!”

 

Niall leans over the banister, and Zayn looks up, inquiring.

 

“Come up here for a sec, would ya? I need a hand with something.”

 

Niall disappears, and Zayn shrugs and heads for the stairs. Somewhere, he hears the shower shut off, and feels that prickling over his skin when it occurs to him that it’s Liam getting out and towelling himself off, somewhere over Zayn’s head.

 

_You’re being useless,_ Zayn flatly informs whatever obnoxious part of his sub-conscious thinks it’s being helpful by supplying him with what Liam probably looks like soaking wet and naked. _You don’t even still want him._ In Zayn’s brain, Liam is drying himself off slowly, eyes closed and mouth slightly open, lips slick and wet, like even the towel on his skin feels really fucking good. _Nobody has a five-year crush on someone they can’t have._

 

Imaginary Liam slides the towel down, palming himself through it. Zayn nearly knocks over a decorative vase. _Jesus, someone give me a lobotomy._

 

Zayn reaches the top of the stairs, and Niall’s nowhere to be found.

 

“Ni?” Zayn calls, a trickle-down of annoyance in his voice – it’s himself he’s irritated with, but he is also less than thrilled when forced to climb stairs for reasons that aren’t immediately apparent. “Where are you, mate?”

 

“On the third floor,” Niall’s voice floats down, muffled, and Zayn sighs and goes up another flight. When he reaches the top of the stairs, Niall emerges from one of the bedrooms.

 

“Just in there,” Niall says, jerking a thumb over his shoulder. “Would you grab the laundry basket? Jay wants me to change all the sheets before the rest of the guests come tomorrow. Don’t ask me why, since it won’t be them sleeping in our bedrooms. It’s a just a thing about the house being neat or whatever.”

 

Zayn shrugs. _Women_ , or something, he guesses. His sisters probably wouldn’t be that obsessive, but then again, he also never thought they’d still pin him down as a fully-grown adult and have a go at putting lipstick on him – _Zayn, it’s PEACH-MANGO, it’s your SHADE_ – so it’s possible he’s not as knowledgeable as he thinks.

 

Ambling into the bedroom, Zayn stops just inside the doorway when he spies one of Harry’s shirts tossed carelessly across the rumpled bedding.

 

He only has time to feel a tingling of suspicion before Niall’s pressing a hand into the middle of his back to coax him further into the room and saying, “Yeah, that one over there – ”

 

And then Niall’s hand is abruptly gone and Zayn hears the door slam behind him even as he turns around. As he’s watching, incredulous, he hears the click of a lock.

 

“Okay?” Zayn says to the empty room.

 

“What are you doing in here?”

 

Zayn spins around, something lurching inside of his chest. Liam’s appeared from the connecting bathroom, and he’s – not naked, which is not as much of a relief as Zayn wants it to be (Zayn stops thinking he needs a lobotomy and starts to wonder if maybe he’s already had one). “What am _I_ doing in here?” He’s not sure why he’s automatically on the defensive. “What are _you_ doing in here?”

 

Liam raises an eyebrow. “This is my room. Mine and Harry’s.”

 

Zayn realizes at once what’s going on. “ _Niall!_ ”

 

The reply is nothing but silence.

 

“What’s going on?” Liam demands.

 

Zayn strides across the room and tries the door. It’s locked, like he knew it would be.

 

“Niall’s locked us in,” he says, turning around furiously, his back to the door. He likes the feeling of glaring at Liam like this is his fault, because that’s much, much easier than behaving like a rational adult.

 

“What?” Liam looks startled, and he crosses the room, reaches past Zayn, and rattles the knob for himself. “He _has_.”

 

Zayn snorts. “Did you think I was making it up?”

 

Liam honestly looks like he doesn’t want to get into it over this. “No, I just – I – _oh._ ”

 

He turns and hurries into the connecting bathroom. A moment later, he returns, looking slightly disappointed.

 

“The door in there is locked as well.”

 

“Shall I go check it to make sure?” Zayn asks, snarky.

 

“Look, I don’t know what your problem is,” Liam begins, but Zayn overrides him.

 

“My _problem_ is that we’re locked into a room together on the _third floor_ , so there’s no possibility of even – climbing out a window,” Zayn snaps.

 

“You’d climb out a window to get away from me?” Liam asks, and Zayn doesn’t try to interpret the expression on his face, because Liam has a knack for looking like the fifteen-year-old version of himself must’ve looked the day no one but Niall showed up to his birthday party.

 

It’s an expression that makes Zayn want to simultaneously hug him and punch him in the face, which is an unhealthy reaction that Zayn refuses to pander to.

 

“Why is there even a lock on the outside of the door?” Zayn asks, instead of answering.

 

Liam makes a face. “Harry noticed and made some crack about how the people who lived here before either had an elderly relative with dementia or they were serial killers and this was their face-peeling room.”

 

Zayn throws up his hands. “Fantastic.”

 

“It’s not that big of a deal, honestly,” Liam says. “I’ll just text Harry or Louis to let us out.”

 

“They’ve gone out,” Zayn replies bitterly, dropping onto the bed. “They went to get breakfast after they nearly burnt the kitchen down.”

 

Liam frowns. “Jay, then.”

 

Zayn just waves a hand at him, indicating that he should do whatever he thinks will work. Liam locates his phone on the night table and quickly taps out a text.

 

A moment later, Liam sighs.

 

Zayn cranes his neck around to look at him. “What?”

 

Liam flips his phone over to show Zayn the answering message:

 

_u boys talk things out. me and ni will let you out when u’ve got everything sorted. XxX :) :) :)_ _  
_

 

“We _did_ talk things out,” Zayn growls.

 

“Did we?” Liam tosses the phone back onto the night table and rubs his eyes. “I mean, we didn’t really.”

 

“I apologized,” Zayn points out.

 

“Yeah.” Liam doesn’t say anything else, but there’s a _but_ in his tone.

 

“What else do you want from me?” Zayn complains.

 

Liam, restless, goes to the window. Zayn’s sitting on the bed, and the only chair in the room is directly across from him. Liam has no interest in having that much eye contact at the present.

 

“I don’t want anything from you,” he says, after a moment.

 

Zayn huffs out a sound that’s nearly a laugh. “Yeah, you made that pretty clear.”

 

Liam looks at him sharply. “Don’t be cryptic; you know I don’t do well with cryptic.”

 

“There is nothing _less cryptic_ than sticking your tongue in someone’s mouth,” Zayn nearly shouts. “I’m sorry I didn’t write you a memo two weeks in advance with an annotated list of my feelings, all right? I thought that kissing you would be _un-subtle_ enough even for _you._ ”

 

Liam looks startled. “ _What_ – ?”

 

“That’s what they want us to talk about, yeah?” Zayn has no patience for any of this. “Fine. Let’s talk about it. The sooner we’re done with it, the sooner we can get _out_.”

 

“Yeah, you can’t wait to get out, can you?” Liam demands, and he’s starting to lose his patience, too. Zayn thinks, grimly: _Good._ “Imagine being stuck in the same room with _me_ for longer than thirty seconds, you’re probably just _dying inside_.”

 

“Stop _doing_ that,” Zayn snaps. “Stop playing the victim. _You_ rejected _me_. You chose Danielle over me and now she won’t even marry you, and that’s all you ever wanted, the stupid – giant wedding with bloody – champagne and flowers everywhere and _engraved invitations_.”

 

Liam flinches back like Zayn has physically gotten up his face, even though neither of them have moved. “You crossed a line, mate.”

 

“Yeah?” Zayn smiles bitterly. “ _Fantastic_.”

 

Liam stares at him, helplessly furious.

 

“I didn’t chose anyone over you,” Liam says, and he’s working so hard to keep his voice down that Zayn wants to shake him, _hit_ him, _force him_ to lose control. Zayn doesn’t think Liam would hit him back but the thought of evoking that kind of reaction makes something molten hot and leaden curl up in Zayn’s stomach. “You kissed a thousand people the way you kissed me. You _went a lot further than that_ with – people with really nice faces and lots of tattoos and outrageous hair.”

 

Zayn stares at Liam incredulously. Embarrassingly conscious of Zayn’s eyes on him, one of Liam’s hands twists into the hem of his t-shirt. “If you’d brought home a single ordinary-looking bloke with an ordinary-looking face and ordinary-looking hair, someone who liked to stay in and watch telly on Saturdays and didn’t smoke or play in a weird indie band, even _once, ever_ , I might’ve thought I stood a chance. But I didn’t, did I? You just kissed me because we’d been drinking and I was there.”

 

Zayn blinks. “ _You_ were drinking.”

 

Liam frowns. “That’s what I said.”

 

“No.” Zayn stands up, facing Liam now, and there’s almost a ludicrous amount of floor space between them, nearly fifteen feet. “You said _we’d_ been drinking. _I_ hadn’t.”

 

Liam stares at him. “You absolutely had been drinking.”

 

“No,” Zayn repeats, very carefully, and there’s an undercurrent of something harsher. “No, I hadn’t, because it was _you_ , wasn’t it? It was you, and I wanted to do it right.”

 

“You kissed me at _random_ ,” Liam objects, and he sounds like he’s scrambling, like the thread of the conversation has evaded his control and comprehension. “Because I came in drunk.”

 

“I didn’t _know_ you’d come in drunk, did I?” Zayn shoots back. “You hardly ever drank at uni.”

 

“But you – but you – ” Liam is at a loss.

 

“Yeah, I did, and you _liked it_ ,” Zayn bites out, because he’s too angry to be as insecure and unsure about that as he usually is. “You _participated_ , don’t act like you didn’t.”

 

Liam shakes his head, trying to find his way back to familiar ground, to the narrative he knows. “I was just going to be another one of your casual shags, and I didn’t _want that_.”

 

“I didn’t want that either,” Zayn nearly shouts.

 

“You could have _said that_ ,” Liam fires back. “You never _said anything_ , you just _left._ I don’t – I take a certain meaning from it when someone just leaves. When I wake up alone, or I come home and find my flat nearly empty, I take that the way it’s obviously meant.” He’s taking little, shallow breaths that make his chest rise and fall quickly.

 

“Well, when someone pauses mid-way through trying to get his face into my y-fronts so he can yell at me about being irresponsible and a shit friend, I also take that the way it’s obviously meant,” Zayn retorts.

 

Liam’s phone buzzes, distracting them both. Zayn snatches it up from the night table, since he’s closest. There's a text from Niall, and it reads:

 

_Maybe talk instead of yelling, yeah?_

 

Zayn’s fingers clench tightly around the phone, and he has a very real moment where he wants to launch it at the wall. He resists, though, and sets it back down on the table.

 

“Fuck this,” he says, to no one in particular, and strides across to the door. “ _Niall._ Let me out right now.”

 

There’s no answer.

 

“I know you’re listening!” Zayn calls out, but there’s still nothing but deafening silence on the other side of the door.

 

Zayn whirls around and looks at Liam, who’s watching him with an odd expression on his face, fists still clenched in anger.

 

Maybe it’s the combination of knowing that Niall won’t let them out until there’s some kind of obvious resolution, as well as understanding, for the first time (very, very slightly) where Liam is coming from, but Zayn crosses the room to Liam, puts a palm flat against his chest, and shoves him hard against the wall.

 

“Take this in the spirit it’s intended this time, would you?”

 

Zayn presses rough fingers into Liam’s jaw, tipping it down in a grip that’s a little harder than it needs to be, and crashes their mouths together. Liam makes a strangled sound and his hands sort of wave uselessly for a moment before they settle on Zayn’s shoulders. There’s pressure there, but he’s not pushing _away_ exactly. Still, he’s not participating, either, letting Zayn kiss him without giving anything back, and Zayn pulls away a moment later, growling in frustration.

 

“ _What_ are we doing?” Liam demands breathlessly, and his lips look worked-over and swollen, which is frustrating because Zayn doesn’t fucking want that to be attractive right now, he really doesn’t.

 

“Nothing,” Zayn says harshly, wiping a hand across his mouth. “Making it clear where I stand with you, I suppose.”

 

“Don’t _do_ that,” Liam snaps, and he catches Zayn’s arm before the latter can walk away. Zayn looks at where Liam’s fingers are curled around his bicep, and when he glances up, his expression is dangerous.

 

“Let go of me.”

 

“No,” Liam replies, and he looks wary but resolved. “Stop leaving.”

 

“I’m good at leaving,” Zayn snarls. “Let me go.”

 

Liam, if anything, looks more determined. "No."

 

They simply look at one another for a long moment, Zayn glaring and Liam staring defiantly back.

 

“Zayn," Liam begins at last, and he's still wearing that expression, like he's going to hold on until Zayn _listens_. “Do you think it’s unreasonable that I would think what I thought?”

 

Zayn’s smile is slow and twisted. “Do I think it’s unreasonable that you would think your best mate would use you for sex? Yeah, I do. Because you were supposed to trust me.”

 

“I was afraid, I told you,” Liam says, patient and quiet. Zayn realizes, with a dull shiver: _We’re talking, not yelling._

 

Fucking _Niall_.

 

“Sex was such a toss-away for you," Liam continues. "It didn’t mean anything.”

 

Zayn doesn’t immediately reply. Liam ploughs through.

 

“And I wasn’t like any of the other – the other people you were always with.”

 

“Only _you_ would think you’re too agonizingly average for anyone to properly love you,” Zayn returns at last, without heat.

 

A faint pink spreads across Liam’s cheeks. “That’s not what I – ”

 

“Shut up,” Zayn says. “This is your last chance. If I kiss you again and you push me away, we’re through.”

 

Liam immediately lets go of Zayn’s arm. “I don’t want you to kiss me.”

 

Zayn stares at him for a moment, then makes an incredulous sound, half-laughter and half-scorn. “All right. That’s clear enough, isn’t it?”

 

“No, that’s not what I meant.” Liam takes a deep breath and lets it out. “I meant, I don’t want you to kiss me _now_.”

 

Zayn takes a step back, embarrassed now, finished with putting himself out there. “Right, well, I’ll just – ”

 

“Don’t leave,” Liam says quietly, and Zayn stops at once because there's something impossibly earnest in Liam's voice.

 

“Can we make a promise?” Liam asks, in the ensuing silence. Zayn doesn't say anything. Liam sounds hesitant when he continues. “Can we make a promise to figure out how to like each other again before we try to add anything else into the mix?”

 

Zayn hadn't expected that. "Anything else being... kissing, I gather, and related activities."

 

Liam worries at his lower lip with his teeth. "Yeah."

 

Zayn tucks his hands into his pockets and regards him carefully. “Then you have to promise not to jump to conclusions,” he says.

 

“And you have to promise not to leave,” Liam concludes. “I mean, you can leave, if I’ve done something or said something that makes you want to go somewhere on your own and be furious for a bit, but you have to promise to come back.”

 

Zayn mulls this over as the two of them watch each other, warily, a little bit familiar and a little bit relieved. “All right then.”

 

Liam’s mouth curls up on one side, in the very smallest of smiles. “Thanks.”

 

Zayn doesn't smile back, but he gives an oddly serious nod, pressing his lips together, and it's like a pact has been made.


	8. In Which Louis Employs a Ruse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _You guys!_ I've been such a failure at updating! Why do you even still talk to me! If you see me in the street, throw things at me! 
> 
> On that note, special thanks to my two anons and musiclily88, who instructed me to get my shit together and post a new chapter.

Liam comes hurtling around the corner of the house when Harry pulls up with Taylor in the passenger seat and Louis in the back.

 

“What’s going on?” Louis asks, clambering over the door of the convertible and landing lightly on the gravel.

 

“Have you seen Niall?” Liam asks.

 

“We just got here,” Louis points out.

 

There’s a shout from the back yard, and Liam takes off back the way he came with no explanation.

 

“All of your friends are super cute, Harry,” Taylor says, opening the door and getting out the regular way, which makes Louis shake his head because it’s a  _convertible_ , make the  _most_  of it.

 

Harry looks faintly alarmed. Louis can see why; if Harry’s too nice to properly tell Taylor to piss off, Liam would be  _done_  for.

 

“But I’m the cutest,” Louis says, to the rescue (and also because he’s got a plan).

 

“Oh, well,  _obviously_ ,” Taylor beams, and Louis smiles right back. The sound of an awkwardly loud door slamming pulls his attention back to Harry, who is watching them both with a suspicious expression.

 

Before anything can come of it, though, Zayn stumbles around the corner of the house and nearly collapses, wheezing.

 

“All right?” Harry asks, as Zayn drops his hands onto his knees and tries to catch his breath.

 

“Seen… Niall?” He asks, between gasps.

 

“Why are you and Liam  _both_  looking for Niall?” Harry asks carefully, because he’s been there for the whole series of events in the timeline of Zayn-and-Liam, the initial blow-up and the fallout and their less-than-stellar reaction to being in the same room together this weekend for the first time in years. The idea of them working together on something makes Harry wonder if he should be alarmed.

 

“We’re going to… throw him… in the pond,” Zayn pants, holding his side. “ _Jesus_ , I’m out of shape.”

 

“You also smoke,” Louis puts in helpfully.

 

Zayn waves a hand at him. “I’ve been cutting back.”

 

Louis nods brightly. “Sounds like it.”

 

“Why are you going to throw him in the pond?” Taylor asks, smiling, as though expecting a cute answer.

 

“Because he’s a shit,” Zayn replies. “A shit who locks people who hate each other in rooms together. Who’re you?”

 

“Oh, I’m Taylor,” she tells him. “Harry’s girlfriend.”

 

Zayn’s eyes flick to Louis and back. “Oh yeah?” He straightens up, hands on his hips, finally getting some semblance of put-togetherness back. “How’s that going?”

 

“Great,” Taylor beams. “Right, Harry?”

 

Harry blinks. “Er.”

 

Zayn raises an eyebrow. “Well, best of luck with that.”

 

Looking like it’s killing him, he drags himself into a limping jog and sets off around the side of the house Liam vanished around a few minutes earlier.

 

“What does he mean by that?” Taylor asks.

 

“No idea,” Harry replies.

 

It’s a few minutes later, when Louis has managed to talk Taylor into scoping out the wedding set-up and the pond (it wasn’t that difficult; she manages to put a seriously impressive amount of pointed significance into the smile she flashes at Harry when she says that she  _loves weddings_  and  _getting ideas for her own wedding_ ), that Louis realizes how much he’s going to have to step up his game.

 

He comes into the kitchen on Harry’s heels, and the moment Brooke sees them, she mutely opens up her arms and Harry sort of just faceplants right into her neck, letting her hold onto him like he’s some kind of over-sized child having a good cry.

 

“Why does he get a hug?” Louis asks indignantly.

 

“Did you not see Taylor in the garden?” Brooke asks. “Harry’s lucky I’m not putting him in witness protection.”

 

Louis hops up onto one of the stools by the counter. “It’s funny, because she doesn’t come  _off_  as a piece of work,” he muses.

 

“Right?” Harry asks wretchedly, his voice muffled by Brooke’s t-shirt. “She seems so  _nice_.”

 

“We know, sweetie, you got sucked in by the pretty hair and how nice she was about all the photos of lampshades and knick-knacks you post on Instagram,” Brooke says soothingly.

 

“She said they were  _art_ ,” Harry says tragically.

 

Brooke has to make stern faces over Harry’s head to ensure that Louis doesn’t laugh. He struggles with it.

 

“Well, then, she sounds like just my level of crazy,” Louis says, once he’s gotten himself under control.

 

“What does that mean?” Harry asks.

 

“It means I’m going to steal her from you,” Louis replies. “And then I’m going to pretend I didn’t mean to because obviously I like dick with a side of dick and can I get dick on that – ”

 

“We get it, you like dick,” Brooke puts in.

 

“ – and that she was reading the signals all wrong.” Louis beams.

 

“I feel like that’s a terrible idea,” Brooke says, after a brief moment of silence.

 

“It’s mean,” Harry mutters, but he pulls away from Brooke and looks at Louis, considering.

 

“So is writing rude songs about someone who hasn’t done anything wrong and posting them on the internet,” Louis replies, unfazed.

 

“I meant terrible more in the sense that she’ll probably have you skinned and wear it as a jacket,” Brooke clarifies. “I don’t care if it’s mean to her. She started it.”

 

Louis grins. “Sometimes I’m glad we’re going to be related via marriage."

 

“What about if you, like, started a fight with me where she could hear us,” Harry suggests, and Louis can’t help but be wickedly pleased that Harry’s started to scheme with him. Brooke looks amused but resigned.

 

“Go on,” Louis says.

 

“If you cause drama during my wedding, I will personally  _hire_  Taylor to write rude songs about  _you_  and post them on the internet,” Brooke warns. “And I will forward the link to every prospective employer, boyfriend, and landlord you ever have.”

 

“You would not,” Louis exclaims, mouth agape.

 

“Try me,” Brooke replies.

 

“My personage  _defies artistic expression._ ”

 

“Sure it does. Until you cause drama during my wedding. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, Tomlinson.”

 

Louis pulls a face at her. Brooke smiles sweetly back.

 

\--

 

“I feel really good about the fact that we almost drowned Niall,” Liam says.

 

“Me as well.” Zayn is standing close but not too close, hands jammed into his pockets. Niall is over on the dock, wringing out his pants and merrily wiggling his bum while he loudly announces that it’s their own fault they’re getting an eyeful and he hopes they’re enjoying the ‘white-as-fuck jigglyness, arseholes’.

 

“At the same time.” Liam cocks his head, and there’s such a long moment of silence after that Zayn glances at him, inquiring. “At the same time,” Liam repeats, “I’m sort of – I’m not unhappy that we’ve finished shouting at each other.”

 

Zayn’s teeth are a flash of white as he bites down on his bottom lip. It’s a small smile, but it’s genuine. “Yeah.”

 

From behind them, there’s the sound of something shattering that’s loud even given how far they are from the house. Liam and Zayn exchange a glance, startled, and start back toward the garden, even as Niall shouts after them, wondering what’s going on.

 

When they get closer, it’s apparent what’s going on: Louis and Harry were in the midst of carrying what looks like a large sheet of mirrored glass down to the wedding tent when it apparently slipped from someone’s hands and broke, shattering all over the walkway.

 

“Brooke’s going to destroy you,” Zayn remarks, sounding impressed.

 

“I cut myself,” Louis complains, showing off a miniscule cut in the webbing between his thumb and forefinger.

 

“That’s going to be the least of your concerns,” Liam assures him.

 

Zayn laughs.

 

“What’s going on?” That’s a woman’s voice, and Liam and Zayn turn around as one, surprised. There’s a blonde standing on the stairs coming down from the balcony. Zayn recognizes her as the one who introduced herself as Harry’s girlfriend.

 

And then Louis starts shouting, and _nothing_ makes sense anymore.

 

“ _Harold!_ I told you I was too upset to carry heavy things right now! You know how getting emotional affects my biceps!”

 

Liam and Zayn spin around and stare at him, astonished. Harry looks equally startled, which Zayn tries and fails not to find amusing.

 

“What?” Harry manages.

 

“Don’t play stupid with me!” Louis starts waving his arms. Liam winces; that’s never a good sign. “It’s your fault I’m upset!”

 

“Why – ” Harry begins, desperately confused, but Louis doesn’t let him finish.

 

“It’s all because of _her!_ ” Louis flings his arm in the direction of the blonde on the balcony. Neither Liam nor Zayn turn around to see how she reacts; they’re both staring at Louis, fascinated and wary and amused.

 

And then Harry’s face transforms. Realization seems to strike him, and then he bites down on a grin and schools his face into what’s probably supposed to be some semblance of ‘vastly upset’ but at best looks ‘slightly perturbed’.

 

Harry’s face may not actually do ‘vastly upset’. It’s not really constructed for that. Louis is proud of the effort he makes, though.

 

“It’s not my fault,” Harry says, and he sounds slightly stilted, but he warms up into it. “I didn’t know she was coming.”

 

“You _didn’t know?_ ” Louis manages to step in the pile of broken glass when he gets up in Harry’s face. He ignores it. “Harry, you told me she wrote an awful song about you and put it on the internet. She said you had _raging crotch warts_. You promised it was over between you and that we were going to start a beautiful romance!”

 

“I – I’m sorry,” Harry says, looking like he might actually laugh.

 

Louis shakes his barely-bleeding hand in Harry’s face. “My hand bleeds!” he hisses. “ _Like my heart_.”

 

Zayn makes a sound that suggests he might be choking.

 

“Honestly, I just – um, I didn’t want to hurt her feelings by telling her she couldn’t come,” Harry says, because talking seems to be the only way he can stop himself from smiling and giving it all away. There’s something earnest about the way he’s talking, though, that’s kind of sweet. “I invited her to the wedding before we, um. Before we broke up, and then…”

 

“And then you couldn’t un-invite her because you’re so _nice_ to everyone!” Louis interrupts, joyfully angry. “You didn’t want to hurt her feelings because you’re such a gentleman!”

 

“I…” Harry turns away, hiding his face. It’s readily apparent to Liam now that he’s trying not to laugh.

 

“Well, guess what, Harry?” Louis jabs a finger into his chest. “I was falling in love with you. But I can’t be with you if you have a girlfriend.” He gives a dramatic shake of his head and whispers tragically: “ _I can’t._ ”

 

“Harry?” That’s the blonde on the steps. Zayn wonders if he should feel bad for forgetting about her entire existence. She sounds hesitant, for the first time. “Harry, is all of this true?”

 

Harry turns toward her, and he’s not laughing now. He looks sort of earnest again. Louis tries not to find it really fucking adorable. “It’s… it’s true, Taylor,” he says. He scrubs a hand through his hair. “You wrote a very unkind song about me. I thought we were through. I…” He coughs. “I’m in love with Louis, you know. But I didn’t want to hurt you once you’d arrived.”

 

“He was very emotionally distressed,” Louis adds. “That’s why he hid, when he saw you. Because he and I have been dating, you see, and I have a tendency to be extremely unstable, and I don’t like to share.”

 

Taylor bites her lip. “Well,” she says, shrugging. “You could’ve just said so.”

 

Harry blinks. “I… I could have?”

 

Taylor rolls her eyes. “I’m not a _monster_ , Harry.”

 

“ _Harry Edward Styles Has Raging Crotch Warts_ ,” Louis, Liam, and Zayn chorus at the same time.

 

“That,” Harry agrees.

 

“I got a lot of hits on that,” Taylor says thoughtfully. “Imagine I could make a living writing insulting songs about my ex-boyfriends.”

 

Harry stares at her.

 

"Seriously, though," she says. "It's _fine_. I suppose. Although you shouldn't invite girls overseas and then ditch them, it's not nice."

 

Louis folds his arms. “Are we done here, then?” He asks, pointedly.

 

Harry can’t tell if he’s still acting or not.

 

“Oh, I’m still coming to the wedding,” Taylor tells him. She seems to like him a lot less than she did before. “I was invited, after all. And I _love_ weddings.”

 

She says it like someone might say they love landmines.

 

“Right,” Louis says. “Right. Well. Well, I’m just going to…” He hooks a hand around Harry’s arm and drags him away, around the house.

 

“That went well,” Harry says brightly as they walk.

 

“Except that if she’s staying for the wedding, we have to act like over-dramatic gay boyfriends until she leaves,” Louis replies darkly.

 

Harry eyes him.

 

“Well, it won’t really be _acting_ for you, will it,” Zayn asks, coming up behind them with Liam in tow, and Harry breaks into a grin because someone else made the joke for him.

 

Louis scowls at everyone.


	9. In Which Everyone Gets Ready for the Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're getting close to the end... and, like. I don't even know. Thanks, I guess, for being awesome and still reading?! You guys are mega-foxy and all-around class acts. Speaking of which, go find me on Tumblr, I'm almost-a-class-act (and if you post 1D or other fun shinanigans, I will most likely follow back). Onward and upward!

“You can tell she’s preoccupied when she just strolls right past the two best-looking blokes in this dump,” Louis says breezily, and his mother stops mid-stride and turns around distractedly. When she sees him, her eyes widen.

 

“Didn’t even see you there, to be honest. Sorry, love. I’m trying to corral twenty-nine bridesmaids into one place so that Lou can finish their hair.”

 

“Twenty-nine?” Louis echoes. “I think some of those might just be passers-by who were eaten by the wedding machine, mum. Did you check? Went out to get the shopping and next thing they knew, they were in pink dresses and heels. The blokes especially must be confused.”

 

Jay smoothes his collar with a little jerk that says if her day were less hectic, she might appreciate his commentary more. “Yes, well, there are only four, but it  _feels_  like twenty-nine. Except your Brooke, though, Niall. She’s been ready for nearly half an hour.”

 

Niall beams. “I’m marrying the best of the lot.”

 

Jay smiles back at him. “Are you nervous, love?”

 

“What’s there to be nervous about?” Niall asks. “She already said yes. The hard bit’s done with.”

 

“Are you kidding?” Louis prods him. “The hard bit is going to be tolerating you for like, six decades.”

 

“I know that, that’s why I’m locking her down now,” Niall replies airily.

 

Jay rolls her eyes at them good-naturedly. “Idiots. I’ll see you in a bit,” she tells them, hurrying off.

 

“Are you actually nervous, though?” Louis asks, once his mother’s quite out of earshot, and Niall seems relieved that he asked.

 

“Fuckin’ bricking it,” he replies, wiping his palms on his fancy trousers.

 

Louis reaches across and squeezes his shoulder. “No need; no matter how many good-looking women you bring into the family, you’ll always be the prettiest Horan to me.”

 

Niall laughs despite himself and swats at him. “Get off, ya wanker.”

 

Louis grins at him. “Sure thing, angel-face.”

 

\--

 

 

It’s been twenty-five minutes since Harry poked his head around the edge of Zayn’s door and asked him to check on Liam in a bit.

 

Zayn knows it’s been precisely that long because that’s how long it takes to style his hair. On a weekday when he doesn’t have to be anywhere special, he’ll trim it down to sixteen or seventeen minutes. Today, though, there’s going to be about a million photographs taken at Niall’s wedding, and Zayn has to make sure his hair looks at least 60% supermodel, 30% artfully tousled, and 10% sex god. He refuses to leave his room with anything less.

 

He doesn’t think that’s unreasonable. When you have a jaw-line like his, why  _waste_  it?

 

Not that he would ever say any of that aloud, because Niall and Harry (and Louis, who Zayn is beginning to suspect is like a version of Harry that’s 900% worse) would make fun of him forever.

 

Liam wouldn’t, not simply because he and Zayn have only just started speaking again, but because he’s always been sort of – kinder than the others. About everything. Not that Zayn doesn’t adore Niall and Harry or anything, because he does (somehow, the idiots), but Liam’s always kind of known where to draw the line better than the others, when to tell everyone to lay off and nudge Zayn and double-check that he’s still smiling.

 

The thought still makes Zayn want to stab his own eyes out, but less so than before he made up with Liam, so that’s, you know – it’s progress.

 

And maybe Zayn spent a little bit longer on his hair than usual because he’s kind of putting off actually going to check on Liam as per Harry’s request. He’s not sure why, but something about going up there and having an ordinary, real conversation with Liam, one-on-one, is slightly terrifying. It’s been a really long time since they’ve managed one, and to be honest, Zayn is kind of – worried.

 

It’s not that he thinks they’ll fall out again, but it’s bound to be awkward. On top of that, he’s just not sure  _why_  Harry wanted him to check up on Liam.

 

“Is he ill?” he’d asked Harry.

 

Harry had just shrugged.

 

Zayn has no idea what that means, but he’s already been locked in a room with Liam this weekend and he doesn’t trust _anyone_.

 

Harry’s been gone for awhile now, though, thumping downstairs to help with the last-minute preparations for the wedding that’s scheduled to begin in less than an hour, so he's unlikely to be a threat. It sounds like a mad-house down there, so obviously Zayn needs to stay upstairs for as long as possible because preparing for a wedding is a spectator sport.

 

Glancing up at the room above him where he knows Liam is getting ready, Zayn hesitates for a long moment, drumming his fingers tunelessly against his knee. He checks his watch. He fiddles with his tie. Then, abruptly, he rises and crosses the room, through the door and up the stairs, not stopping until he’s rapped on the door frame and there’s no turning back.

 

He’s not a coward. He was just waiting for that surge of courage.

 

“Come in.” Liam’s voice is muffled but he doesn’t sound ill, and Zayn pushes open the door about halfway, unsure.

 

“Hey. It’s me.”

 

Liam glances round in surprise. He’s sitting on the far side of the bed, his back to the door, and he’s wearing his shirt and tie with the jacket draped on the bed next to him.

 

“Um.” Zayn gestures meaninglessly. “Harry made it sound like you might… be under the weather, so, yeah. He just thought I should come check on you or – yeah.”

 

Something flits across Liam’s face. “I’m not ill,” he says.

 

“Yeah,” Zayn agrees, nodding. “Yeah, I can see that.” Has he said  _yeah_  enough times in the last thirty seconds? They should give out awards for such flawless use of linguistic filler. “Sorry, I’ll just – ”

 

He’s almost completely out the door again before he changes his mind.

 

“Harry wouldn’t ask me to check on you for, like, no reason.” Zayn’s not sure where this is coming from, but he keeps one hand on the door knob and the other on the frame, like Liam will have to physically move him if he wants to get out of the room.

 

“I never have any idea what goes on in Harry’s mind, to be honest,” Liam says, standing up and turning to face Zayn properly. “I’m fine. Never better.”

 

Liam’s smile looks forced.

 

“What’ve you got in your hand?” Zayn asks, because apparently he’s not as smart as he always thought he was and he wants to push the envelope until Liam’s polite front breaks down and he tells Zayn to fuck right off.

 

Liam looks down at his right hand, the one that’s curled in a fist, and there’s a flash of guilt on his face that Zayn spots at once, because Liam has always been an open book to Zayn.

 

“I wish you wouldn’t – ” Liam begins, at the same time as Zayn comes into the room and shuts the door behind him. Liam watches him, perplexed and maybe a little anxious, as Zayn approaches him and holds out his hand.

 

“Give it to me,” Zayn says.

 

Liam opens his mouth – to object, perhaps, or to offer an explanation, but in the end he does neither. Instead, he simply sets Danielle’s white-gold engagement ring in Zayn’s outstretched palm, then slides both hands into his pockets.

 

Zayn’s not sure if he was expecting that or not. Now that the ring is sitting there, a tiny, barely-there weight in his hand, he can look up at Liam and properly see the strain in the corners of his eyes. It’s been there all weekend, and everyone’s walked past it.

 

“Sit down,” Zayn says.

 

“Zayn,” Liam sighs.

 

“Sit,” Zayn repeats.

 

Liam does.

 

“Talk to me,” Zayn says.

 

“We don’t do that anymore,” Liam objects, with a note of petulance in his voice that Zayn, oddly, warms right up to, because _this_ is familiar.

 

“Pretend we do,” he replies, refusing to be put off. He folds his arms and waits.

 

“I’m just…” Liam drags a hand down his face, looking unhappy. “Can you not stand there like that?”

 

Zayn shrugs. When Liam stays silent and goes on looking miserable, Zayn gives in and perches on the edge of the bed, a solid eighteen inches between the two of them. There’s nowhere else to sit.

 

Liam doesn’t even react to that, at first. Then, as though he’s been working himself up to it, he says: “I kind of always thought it’d be me.”

 

Zayn doesn’t even have to wonder what he’s talking about. “To get married first,” he clarifies.

 

 “Yeah.” Liam sounds disappointed in himself, like he let someone down by saying that aloud. “I thought me and Danielle were going to go all the way, and then… and obviously I’m really happy for Niall, I _am_ , but all of this is just the sort of thing that Dani and I used to talk about and now it’ll never be real.”

 

Zayn is silent for a moment, watching the area rug like it says something insightful. “That’s…”

 

“Selfish,” Liam supplies, practically before Zayn gets a word out. “I know. I don’t have the right to ruin it for Niall by being stupid.”

 

“Nah.” Zayn glances at him then, watching his profile, because _trust Liam_ to think that he's being unreasonable when honestly, if Zayn were in his place, he'd probably have sulked all weekend. “I wasn’t going to say selfish.”

 

Liam makes a funny little sound. “What were you going to say?”

 

Zayn gives a one-shouldered shrug. “Don’t properly know the word for it, I don’t think, or it’s got away from me, but, like… sometimes when you lose someone that you care about, you don’t realize right away what that actually means. And then when it hits you later, when it really settles in, it’s like…” Zayn skims one hand lightly across the other one: _Impact._ “And that’s not selfish, because you feel what you feel. You can’t help that.”

 

Liam looks tired. “Wish I _could_ help it.”

 

“Yeah, well, we all wish that, but sometimes things are shit.” Zayn doesn’t care if that’s helpful or not; it’s the truth.

 

“It’s just – you put your _everything_ into one person, right,” Liam says, “and you trust them with that, and then one day they’ve gone suddenly and there’s nothing left to hold you up, you just _fall_.”

 

They’re both silent for a long moment, and if Zayn wants to bring up how scary-similar it felt to lose Liam after their falling-out in uni, he manages to bite it back.

 

Instead, eventually, he says, “You know you can tell people these things. You don’t have to sit there and be, like, _miserable_ , and wait for someone to notice.”

 

Liam looks at him surprise. “It's _Niall's wedding;_  that's where the proper focus should be. I don’t _want_ to talk about it.”

 

“Well, you just did,” Zayn points out.

 

“With you, though,” Liam mutters. “It’s different.”

 

“How?” Zayn asks.

 

“Because you get it, don’t you,” Liam says too quickly, steadfastly not looking at Zayn, and Zayn thinks, _oh._

 

“Yeah,” he replies, with a little huff of sound that might be a laugh but sounds like it hurts. “I get it.”

 

“Well, I’m sorry,” Liam says.

 

“I’m the one who left,” Zayn reminds him.

 

“Doesn’t matter. I’m sorry anyway.”

 

Zayn expels a breath and breaches the distance between them, not so much getting up as just sort of sloping over tuck an arm around Liam’s shoulders.

 

“What’s that for?” Liam asks in a small voice.

 

“Because you looked so fucking sad,” Zayn tells him. “And I hate when you look like that, it’s ridiculous on a grown man.”

 

He doesn’t sound unkind, though. Liam kind of leans toward him just slightly and doesn’t reply.

 

-

 

“Niall! _Niall._ ”

 

Niall spins on his heel and nearly catches himself an armful of fast-moving Jay.

 

“All right?” he asks, concerned.

 

“Have you seen Louis?” she demands. “I’ve looked _everywhere._ ”

 

“No,” Niall replies. “Last I checked he was – ”

 

“Out front loudly proclaiming his fake relationship with Harry while that little blonde thing sulked up a storm, yeah,” Jay interrupts. “But where’s he gone _now_?”

 

“Is Harry missing also?” Niall inquires.

 

Jay freezes. “I suppose.”

 

Niall blinks innocently.

 

Jay stares at him. “But they’re not.”

 

Niall shrugs.

 

“Not _today_ ,” Jay denies, in a tone that makes Niall fear for their safety.

 

“I don’t know anything,” Niall says breezily, slipping his hands into his pockets.

 

“Stop that, you’ll ruin the line of the jacket,” Jay snaps, even as she whips past him, alternately yelling Louis’ name and inventive death threats.

 


	10. In Which Niall Gets Married and Everyone Lives Happily Ever After, Mostly

Harry gasps when both of Louis’ hands wrap very firmly around his cock.

 

“What is – not that I object, but what are you doing?”

 

Louis grins at him. “I’m putting my hands down your trousers.”

 

“Yes – _ah._ ” Harry gulps when Louis twists his hands in opposite directions. “Yes, I gathered. Both hands.”

 

“I’m trying something out,” Louis volunteers cheerfully.

 

“Oh. Oh, good.” Harry expels a breath. “I was just curious about the – _oh_ – timing.”

 

“I liked your dress pants,” Louis explains. “They fit you very well.”

 

“Thanks,” Harry beams. “They’re – _ahh_. They’re tailored.”

 

“I know they are.” Louis lazily runs his thumb over the head of Harry’s cock, provoking a shudder.

 

“It’s just that…” Harry bites his lip. “It’s just that I’m not sure I’ll be able to return the favour.”

 

“Imminently or ever?” Louis asks, hands not pausing in the slightest.

 

“Well, imminently,” Harry points out. “As we’re both standing in a wedding that starts in three minutes.”

 

“Oh.” Louis glances at Harry’s watch; his own is rather hidden at the moment. Harry helpfully tips the face so he can see it, even as his head falls back against the wall of canvas stretched between two poles. “Well, we’ll just have to hurry then,” he says, falling into a rhythm that prompts Harry to make a strangled sound.

 

“Yeah,” Harry says, strained and beautifully dry. “Right, sorry. Here I was taking my time.”

 

“Sarcasm gets you nowhere, Harold,” Louis informs him.

 

-

 

Niall is sweaty to the point where he can’t take his jacket off to cool down because he’s worried that he’s soaked through his shirt. It’s not that it’s the absolute warmest day they’ll have all summer, but the sun is shining and the tent has somewhere around a hundred people in it, meaning that it’s holding in the heat. Additionally, Niall is profoundly less zen than he thought he’d be at this moment of this day, so that’s not helping matters.

 

He can’t figure out if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that he can find neither Louis nor Harry. After Jay had mentioned to him that they were missing and had gone tearing off to look for them (before likely being sidetracked by a bridesmaid or four), Niall had decided to focus his not-inconsiderable anxiety on where the hell they could be. It takes his mind off Brooke and the actual wedding, which is the good-news part. And he knows that Louis, while irresponsible at times, wouldn’t let him down on this one; neither would Harry, not on your life.

 

So he’s waiting at the front of the tent, where he ought to be, discretely firing off text messages that neither of them return, and he knows that any minute it will be time for Brooke to come in. People are still talking amongst themselves, but Niall knows that enough people are watching that he can’t just dissolve into a pool of sweat and itchy suit and never come back (he likes to entertain the thought that this might be a possibility if no one _were_ watching; it’s oddly comforting).

 

“All right?” Niall startles; he hadn’t even heard Liam come up behind him.

 

“Yeah,” he replies. “Well, my best men are missing and I’m sweating like a whore in church under my jacket but otherwise, can’t complain.”

 

Liam frowns. “They’re both missing?”

 

Niall snorts. “Of course they’re both missing. What would one of them individually be doing?”

 

Liam looks confused for a moment before comprehension dawns. “Oh. _Oh._ Do you reckon?”

 

“Well, they’re not off playing croquet,” Niall replies.

 

“Right.” Liam looks like he’d much prefer it if they _were_ off playing croquet. Croquet is a game Liam can get behind. “Should I go look for them?”

 

All at once, there is a high-pitched scream from outside of the tent.

 

“Nah, not necessary,” Niall replies.

 

A moment later, Louis stumbles into the back of the tent, smoothing his hands over his hair and looking like a deer in the headlights.

 

“All right?” Niall asks, when Louis reaches the raised area at the front where he and Liam are standing.

 

“Um.” Louis blinks at him. “Yes. Yes, excellent.”

 

“Where’s Harry?” Liam asks.

 

“Left him for dead,” Louis replies brightly.

 

“Who screamed?” Niall asks, trying not to laugh.

 

“Your granddad,” Louis replies. “It was impressively high-pitched.”

 

“So are the two of you a thing now?” Liam asks.

 

“Hush,” Louis says. “It’s bad luck to initiate these things at a wedding, Liam, do you know _nothing_?”

 

There’s a rustling behind them, and then Harry’s being pushed up onto the raised dais by an irate-looking Jay. His hair is slightly ruffled and he forgot to zip his trousers, but he smiles winningly at them. No one says anything about his flies, coming to the silent mutual conclusion that it’s funnier this way.

 

“Can we _please_ get this show on the road?” Jay demands, in a less-than-discrete stage whisper. It’s not like she need have bothered; the entire tent full of wedding guests in watching them anyway, looking alternately bored, amused, and slightly alarmed.

 

“’course we can,” Louis says. “Quit holding us up, mum, for _goodness_  sake.”

 

If she doesn’t murder him, it’s because there are too many witnesses.

 

-

 

The day has descended into a warm evening, the sky scattered with stars, people making merry under the big white reception tent on the lawn. Liam walks across the grass toward Zayn, a solitary figure lit only by the cherry of his cigarette. Liam had looked for him under the tent, and, being unable to find him, had interrupted Niall trying to lick cake off Brooke’s face (as she dodged away, looking both disgusted and amused) to ask if he’d seen him.

 

“Out for a dart, maybe,” Niall had suggested.

 

So here Liam is.

 

Zayn must hear him coming, because he half-turns, striking an easily-recognizable profile in the dark.

 

“Hey,” Liam says, coming up beside him.

 

“Hey.” Zayn expels a stream of smoke as they stand side by side, looking out over the pond.

 

“I’m going to sit,” Liam decides. He does so, flopping down onto the grass. A moment later, Zayn joins him.

 

“What do you reckon Harry and Louis are up to?” Zayn asks.

 

“Well, I’ve just come from the tent, and last I checked, they’re trying to convince the DJ to play ‘Do You Really Want to Hurt Me’ a number of times in a row,” Liam answers.

 

“That sounds terrible,” Zayn says, sounding faintly amused.

 

“It absolutely does,” Liam agrees with a laugh.

 

They’re silent for a moment. Zayn tosses his cigarette butt away into the grass finally and says, “How sold are you on that whole being-friends-for-a-bit thing?”

 

“What?” Liam asks, caught off-guard.

 

“I mean, like. Obviously I’d rather be – you know, friends, than whatever we were before.” Zayn exhales slowly. “But I’m sort of drunk and we’re at a wedding and I don’t really want to be, um. Alone.”

 

“It reminds you that you are, sort of, doesn’t it,” Liam says, as Zayn hums his agreement.

 

Another moment of silence drags by before Zayn says, “But, like. I meant it, when I asked how sold you are on being just friends.”

 

“I heard you,” Liam says. “Because you don’t want to be alone.”

 

“Don’t put it like that,” Zayn says. “That’s not what I meant.”

 

Liam realizes that his heart is beating very fast. “What did you mean?”

 

Zayn looks over at him, properly. “It’s not that I want to be not-alone with just, like. Anyone.”

 

“No?” Liam asks weakly, as Zayn edges closer.

 

“No.” Zayn very deliberately leans into his space. “I meant that watching one of our best mates get married made me want to be not-alone with you.”

 

Liam can smell Zayn’s cologne, like lavender and some other flower he can’t identify, maybe because he’s drunk or because Zayn’s so close his brain doesn’t do the thing.

 

“Or maybe I’m just shit at identifying flowers,” he says aloud.

 

Liam will be forever grateful for the way Zayn doesn’t question that at all.

 

“Shut up, Liam,” he says, and tilts his head, bringing their lips together.

 

Liam’s kissed more than a tiny handful of people in his life. It’s not that he’s never felt that silly, boyish thrill travel down his spine, or that curl of warmth in his belly. But with Zayn it’s like picking up where he left off in his favourite story, and that little bit of friction at an awkward angle is not going to end up being enough.

 

Liam catches Zayn by the biceps, tugging a little, and Zayn gets the message, clambering up onto his knees without breaking the kiss for any longer than it takes to change angles. Liam lets his knees fall open and Zayn crawls in between, dragging his fingers up into Liam’s hair, and Liam wonders if, like, if this is maybe the best he’s ever felt, with the music traveling across the grass – _Do You Really Want to Hurt Me_ , his brain registers dimly – and the slightly unbalanced way he’s half-supporting Zayn’s weight while Zayn makes tiny, delicious little sounds right into Liam’s mouth.

 

“Well, we called that, didn’t we?”

 

That’s Louis’ voice, and Liam is all for ignoring him, frankly – Zayn shivers when you suck on his lower lip, something Liam is keen to explore further – but Zayn looks up, trying to look as unflustered as possible, and says, “I’m not that predictable.”

 

“Are you kidding?” Louis says, flopping down next to them. Harry joins him, looking across at them with a twinkle in his eye.

 

“All right there, Liam?” he asks.

 

And Liam – oh, right, is still holding onto Zayn’s arms with Zayn’s body between his knees. Liam doesn’t even flush, for once; he simply switches his grip, turns Zayn gently around, and lets him lean back against Liam’s chest. Zayn doesn’t seem overly displeased with this turn of events.

 

“We’re having a toast, by the way,” Louis says. Turning back to the tent, he shouts, “Oi! Nialler! Hurry up!”

 

“I don’t understand why I had to steal the liquor,” Niall shouts back, waving a bottle in the air as he crosses the lawn toward them. “I don’t even drink it.”

 

“Exactly. No one would suspect you,” Louis replies.

 

“It’s the perfect crime,” Harry adds.

 

“I don’t have a glass,” Liam says.

 

“I thought you were a boy scout, Liam,” Louis scolds. “What happened to being prepared?”

 

“It’s champagne,” Niall says, as he draws closer. “You don’t need a glass. What kind of person drinks champagne out of a glass?”

 

“Says the man who used to have a drinking problem,” Louis says fondly. Niall plays a momentary game of keep-away with the bottle as revenge, until Louis finally snags it out of his hands.

 

“All right, so,” Niall begins, dropping down next to Harry on the grass. “I wanted to have a toast with my wedding party, without whom this weekend would’ve been – like, much more manageable.”

 

“Less mental,” Louis says agreeably.

 

“Practically drama-free,” Harry puts in.

 

“But it also would’ve been pretty boring, I reckon,” Niall adds. “And you did sort of help a bit.”

 

“To helping a bit,” Louis says solemnly, raising the bottle.

 

“Nah, hang on, though,” Niall says. “I’m serious, lads. Without you, I would’ve had a lot less to take my mind off of being nervous about today. And going further back, the four of you helped to turn me into the person that I am, the person Brooke somehow puts up with, so I’m grateful for that.”

 

Louis, business-like, hands the champagne bottle to Harry and then flings himself at Niall for a hug.

 

“All right, you goddamn delinquent, let me finish my speech,” Niall says, muffled, before he manages to push Louis off. “What I wanted to say was, here’s to you lot.”

 

Harry grins. “To us.”

 

“To us,” Zayn and Liam echo.

 

“To Niall’s wedding!” Louis crows.

 

Harry showers everyone with champagne.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bet you guys thought there wasn't gonna be a last chapter of this... we procrastinators are so sneaky like that. Thanks for reading!! Sincerely. And an extra-special thanks to everyone who's left a lovely comment, because there are a very many more of you than I ever anticipated and I am humbled. Find me on Tumblr, I'm almost-a-class-act!


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